Freemasonry

Forward To The 1st, 2nd, 3rd, And 4th Editions

          The intent of the present work is to deal with the principal problems of Freemasonry in a concise manner. It makes no claim to completeness; rather, it intends to provide documentation based on authentic materials from the archives of the Security Service of the Reich Leader Of The SS and Secret State Police, thereby educating the public to the danger posed by Freemasonry over the past several centuries. A detailed description of the irreconcilable conflict between the ideology of Freemasonry and that of National Socialism, based on the fullness of the available archive material, must be left to later works.

 

Heydrich
SS-Obergruppenfьhrer
1938.

Forward To The 5th Revised Edition

          In 1942, World Freemasonry celebrated the 225th anniversary of its founding. Like the 200th anniversary, the 225th anniversary was celebrated during wartime -- during a war for which World Freemasonry was once again partly responsible. But how different is the situation of Freemasonry compared to 1917! Then, it stood at the height of its influence and enjoyed immeasurable political power. Today, by contrast, it is being called upon to render an account: the healthy Folks of Europe have overcome the corrupting poison of the Masonic ideology; the powerful forces of Freemasonry have suffered serious reverses, and must furthermore expect that their days are numbered in Europe.

          Political developments since the publication of this text have confirmed the correctness of the statements made in it. Once again, World Freemasonry has given rise to forces directed against all racially healthy movements, simultaneously creating the impetus for a total extinction of those movements.

          An awareness that the rejuvenated Folks of Europe must remain alert to the disintegrating corruption of liberal Masonic thought in order to prevent any regrouping and renewed grab for power, has impelled the author to publish a revised and supplemented edition for the German and European Folks, in order to make a small contribution to the total spiritual healing of the European community of Folks.

 

Dieter Schwarz
1942.

Forward To The 6th Edition

          Among the spiritual forces secretly working in the camp of Germany's enemies and their allies in this war, as in the last, stands Freemasonry, the danger of whose activities has been repeatedly stressed by The Leader in his speeches.

          The present brochure, now made available to the German and European Folks in a 6th edition, is intended to shed light on this enemy working in the shadows. Though an end has been put to the activities of Masonic organisations in most European countries, particular attention must still be paid to Freemasonry, and most particularly to its membership, as the implements of the political will of a supragovernmental power. The events of the summer of 1943 in Italy demonstrate once again the latent danger always represented by individual Freemasons, even after the destruction of their Masonic organisations. Although Freemasonry was prohibited in Italy as early as 1925, it has retained significant political influence in Italy through its membership, and has continued to exert that influence in secrecy. Freemasons thus stood in the first ranks of the Italian traitors who believed themselves capable of dealing Fascism a death blow at a critical juncture, shamelessly betraying the Italian Nation. The intended object of the 6th edition of this brochure is to provide a clearer knowledge of the danger of Masonic corruption, and to keep the will to self defence alive.

 

Dr. Kaltenbrunner
SS-Gruppenfьhrer
General Of The Police
1943.

        Freemasonry is an ideological form of hostility to National Socialism, the significance of which, in the historical development of the past two centuries, must be deemed comparable to the effects of other supranational organisations, the political churches, world Jewry, and Marxism. In its present form, it must be viewed as the bourgeois liberal advance troops of World Jewry.

        It corrupts the principles of all forms of government based on racial and Folkish considerations, enables the Jews to achieve social and political equality, and paves the way for Jewish radicalism through its support for the principles of freedom, equality, and brotherhood, the solidarity of Folks, the League Of Nations and pacifism, and the rejection of all racial differences.

        With the help of its international connections and entanglements, Freemasonry interferes in the foreign policy relationships of all Folks, and pursues, through governmental leaders, secret foreign and world policies which escape the control of those in government.

        Through its personal influences and economic favouritism, Freemasonry ensures that all dominant positions of the public, economic, and cultural life of a Folk are filled with lodge brethren, who in fact translate the concepts of Freemasonry into action.

        The National Socialist State has destroyed the organisations of Freemasonry in Germany, and has likewise given rise to similar measures in a number of European States during the present war. But the liberal, Masonic body of thought lives on in the former lodge brethren. In addition, there is still a danger of a renewed penetration of Masonic ideas through the lodge organisations of States in which Freemasons remain free to pursue their objectives without hindrance.

Background Of Masonic symbolism

        Thus, researching this enemy, and providing a basic education for all racial comrades on the topic of Freemasonry, is not just a matter of expounding upon interesting historical problems; rather, it is an urgent duty of alertness in the struggle against our enemy.

Jahweh

        Freemasonry is tightly allied with Jewry, and not just through its organisation. Even the symbolism of Freemasonry points to Jewry through its customs, and to Hebrew through its words and signs, as its real origin. The Masonic conceptual universe is a reflection of Jewish near eastern images and concepts. The central point of Old Testament thought is represented by the concept of Yahweh as the Jewish God. Initially, the belief in many national deities prevailed among the Jews, for whom Yahweh was still an entirely insignificant desert god, until he sought out a Folk (the nomadic tribe of Israel) with whose help he could set about to dethrone all other gods and achieve world domination. In later Jewry, Yahweh was conceived of first as a High God, then as the One God; but his original nature was strictly retained. To Jewry, the name Yahweh implies a program of world enslavement (see Isaiah LX.).

The Temple

        With the development of the concept of Yahweh, the centralisation of the Jewish religious cult was complete. Instead of the original numerous places of sacrifice in Canaan, a single one appeared: first Shilo (later Jerusalem); then the Royal Tent, and later, the Temple of Solomon were considered the House Of Yahweh. Just like Yahweh himself, the Temple became a symbol of Jewish plans for world domination (see Ezekiel XL-XLVIII; see also the New Testament, Revelation Of Saint John, XXI).

        In the period after the Babylonian Captivity, Prophetic Jewry was supplemented by the priestly Teachings Of The Law (Torah) and the Books Of Wisdom (Chokmah). Bourgeois decency and social order were derived through heavy borrowings from neighbouring cultures, while Yahweh was given a cosmic characterisation as the World Master Builder. At the same time, the way was paved for internationalistic attitudes (spreading of Messianic teachings).

The Mysteries

        The spiritual attitudes of the Syriophoenician mysteries merged with Old Testament thought about the time of the birth of Christ. The mysteries assumed a feeling of sinfulness: an inwardly torn human being to whom divine mercy was to be granted through mystical, that is, secret words, signs, and rituals, thereby achieving salvation and personal eternal bliss. All evil was attributed to the Devil (dualism). These concepts, sometimes depicted with great descriptive power, were reflected in the Jewish Apocrypha and New Testament texts around the time of the birth of Christ, as well as in the Gnostic writings of the following period.

        This whole conceptual world was given a new lease on life through the symbolism and teachings of Freemasonry. The legend of Hiram, the symbol of the Temple with its religious strictures, the testing of courage upon acceptance into the lodge, the symbolic death ritual, the secret signs of recognition, embody in a perceptible, visual manner that which is later revealed in their teachings (the shaping of men from a rough stone into a cube, the building of a Temple Of Humanity, the Messianic, Empire Of Peace and of World Brotherhood, the rejection of all natural racial and political barriers in World Brotherhood). The symbols and teachings are, however, not uniformly developed based on definite original forms, but exhibit a colourful mixture of ingredients of the widest variety of types (syncretism), which makes it much more difficult to prove their origin in any particular case.

The bearer of Jewish thought

        This near eastern conceptual world was first communicated to the entire West through the Church, which loyally guarded its Jewish heritage. The Arabian influence of Islam beginning in the 7th century, the experiences of the Crusades beginning in the 11th century, as well as the influence of Jewish philosophers (Ibn-Gebirol, Maimonides, the Cabbalists) beginning in the 12th century, led to a stronger emphasis on this Jewish derived conceptual world. Jewish attitudes thus returned to the western field of vision, whence they had been driven out by German scholasticism.

        Christian Cabbalists (Pico de Mirandola) acquired particular prestige in the academies and religious associations of the Renaissance.

Renaissance

        Scholars occupied themselves primarily with Hebrew texts, in which an eccentric search for secrets and bizarre insights may have played a part. These efforts were transmitted to Germany through Johannes Reuchlin and others. Secret societies were formed which attempted to build Jewish fantasies with theological elements into a system through an admixture of alchemy, mathematics, astronomy, and astrology, as well as magic.

The documents from 1390 and 1450

        In contrast to the character of western building site huts and the customs of western stone cutters and stone cutter associations, an orientally derived picture of history may be observed in the Regius Manuscript of 1390 and the Cooke Manuscript of 1450, two of the oldest manuscripts relating to medieval English construction workers. These documents contain, in corporate lore, an extract, maintained in legendary form, of corporate history and bylaws (statutes) regarding behaviour within the corporation and the fulfilment of comradely duties towards fellow craftsmen. These two oldest documents were followed by several others of similar import. It is significant that the content of this corporate lore was always increasingly based, and in an increasingly detailed manner, upon the Old Testament legendary and conceptual world. It is claimed by Freemasons that these Old Testament foundations were brought into the corporations by Reverends, who looked after the spiritual well being of the English corporations as pastors.

        These Reverends played still another significant role in the development of Freemasonry. They were the first noncorporate members of the corporate societies, together with the noble patrons of the corporations who had assumed the representation of the guilds before the authorities, and who enjoyed the right to appoint a nominee to a vacant ecclesiastical benefice involving property rights through the guilds. Over the course of time, a situation arose in which these patrons and reverends introduced friends and relatives into the guilds, which had in the meantime assumed the name of lodges, as members. This was especially true of the stone cutter lodges.

Nonguild members in the stone cutter guilds

        Thus, as early as the second half of the 17th century, we find a great proportion of such noncorporate members in various corporate lodges. In these associations, the concept of professional and guild comradeship receded increasingly into the background in favour of sociability. Outwardly, this development was characterised by the fact that these lodges moved their headquarters outside the guild halls and into taverns.

Origin of the word Freemason

        The belief that the contrast between guild masons and accepted, but nonguild members of the lodges, found its expression in the term Free And Accepted Masons, is unfounded. This designation was used for all lodge members, even guild member masons. By the end of the 17th century, we find the term Freemason already generally in use, as shown by several texts from the period and by a student joke at Trinity College in Dublin in 1688. In texts and descriptions from the 17th century, we also see nonguild members in the lodges already practising a symbolic masonry.

Grand Lodge of London, 1717

        In the year 1717, a new period in the history of Freemasonry began. In this year, four London lodges merged into the Grand Lodge Of London And Westminster to celebrate the name of their patron, John The Baptist, in fellowship and in a dignified manner. Initially, therefore, the grounds for the merger were purely social.

        It is important that there were no longer any corporate masons among the officials of this new Grand Lodge. Reliable information on the early years of this new organisation is unavailable.

Masonic personnel policy

        In 1721, the Grand Lodge Of London succeeded in winning over a member of the English high aristocracy, Duke Montagu, for the office of Grand Master. Thus began a development which has characterised English Freemasonry down to the present day, because ever since that time, the aspiration of English Freemasonry has always been to win converts from the highest levels of the aristocracy. A large scale Masonic membership policy thus began, the aim of which to place Freemasons in all the leading positions of the British Empire; thus, there can hardly be any question of a conflict between Freemasonry and British government leadership. This is the true significance of the assertion that England uses Freemasonry as a tool of world politics. The power of the English Freemasons was clearly demonstrated in 1799, when they first defeated a draft law against secret societies in the English Parliament, and then amended it in such a manner that Freemasons were expressly excluded from its edicts.

The Ancient Duties

        Upon the proposal of the Duke Of Montagu and under the Grand Mastership of Wharton, the first book appeared containing the bylaws of Freemasonry, authored by Reverend Anderson. In the main part of the book, the so called Ancient Duties, which assumed great significance in the further development of Freemasonry, were developed into principles for the first time. Together with the Ancient Landmarks Of Freemasonry, a summary of Masonic laws and traditions, the Ancient Duties are still decisive in the ideological orientation of Freemasonry today.

        Freemasonry reached France through English emigrants. In 1725, the first lodge was founded at an English innkeeper's. A second Masonic lodge was opened in 1729. Freemasonry spread very rapidly in France. In contrast to England, development was less uniform. Two lines of development must be distinguished in 18th century French Freemasonry.

Age of the Enlightenment

        One line worked in a speculative, educational direction. To it belonged, in particular, the intellectual forerunners and thinkers of the French Revolution, such as Paine, Montesquieu, Voltaire, Mirabeau, Marat, Lafayette, Philippe Egalite, and Abbe Sieyes.

Encyclopaedists

        In Paris, the lodge of the Encyclopaedists, called The Nine Sisters, was active from 1769. Among the members of this lodge were Helvetius, Lalande, Benjamin Franklin, Count La Rochefoucauld, d'Alembert, Camille Desmoulins, Diderot, and Brissot.

The thought of the French Revolution

        Here, the guiding principles and ideas of the French Revolution were given their characteristic features and further developed. The slogan of Liberty, Equality, Fraternity, the principle of the equality of all who bear a human face, the universal rights of man, were all worked out in this lodge, and advocated aggressively in a revolutionary spirit. A general inversion of all values set in. The governmental form of absolutism and its opposition to Masonic democracy and republicanism was the object of particular animosity in these conflicts.

        This direction reached its climax, and at the same time, its temporarily successful conclusion, in the French Revolution. 629 lodges were then at work in France, 65 of which were located in Paris alone.

The Order concept

        During the same period, however, another current came to be felt in French Freemasonry, bearing a more Catholicising character. This current wished to lead Freemasonry back to the medieval orders. The Scot Ramsay, tutor to the pretender to the British throne, must be viewed as their chief representative. He was a friend of Archbishop Fenelon and converted to Catholicism upon Fenelon's suggestion, becoming a member of the Order of Lazarites. Since many Catholic priests still belonged to the Masonic lodges during this period, it may be assumed that attempts were made by Catholics to change the meaning of Freemasonry from within, and to make its activities useful to the Church.

Higher degrees

        Out of this current, the most varied system of higher degrees soon developed, which spread actively throughout this period.

Strict observance

        It must be mentioned in this connection that the founder of Strict Observance in Germany, the Baron von Hund und Altengrotkau, must have come into contact with representatives of these circles during his stay in Paris. He too, converted to Catholicism. Strict Observance was a higher degree system, which, in the world of the German lodges, succeeded in gaining great influence at that time, and which aimed at shaping all of Freemasonry into an association of knightly orders. Its members were dutybound to a special, unrestricted duty of the strictest obedience and submission (STRICTA OBSERVANTIA) through the so called Act Of Obedience.

Penetration of Jews into the English and French lodges

        The notion of tolerance, which is anchored in the Ancient Duties and was further developed together with the Masonic ideal of humanity in the France of the Enlightenment, enabled the Jews, with the help of Freemasonry, to penetrate bourgeois society at an early date in England and France, and then to achieve emancipation. In 1723 and 1725, Jewish names already appear in the membership lists of English Masonic lodges. In 1732, one lodge changed the meeting from Saturday evening to Sunday simply to permit Jewish members to take part in the work of the lodge. Jewish influence appears to have been rather great at that time, since as early as 1732 the street orator Henley gave a speech attacking Jew Masons. The Ancient Masons, who appeared around the middle of the 18th century, had a special prayer for Jewish lodges.

Jewish higher degree organisations

        In France, this development moved ahead much more rapidly, and ended in the French Revolution, with complete social and political equality for the Jews.

        Various higher degree systems were worked out around the middle of the 18th century by business hungry Jews, and sold as secret lore at high prices.

1737 first lodge in Germany

        The first lodge, which later took the name Absolom and worked directly under the Grand Lodge of London, was founded in Hamburg in 1737 under the leadership of the Freemason Charles Sarry. English influence was visible in the membership policy of this lodge, which was to win over heads of state and influential personalities as converts.

Frederick The Great

        This led to efforts to convert the heir to the Prussian throne, later Frederick The Great, who was steered into Freemasonry in a very skilful manner, but who lost interest in Freemasonry as early as the first year of his reign, and who expressed himself quite disparagingly on the activity of the lodges in later years.

        The English line of influence was also followed in the founding of the lodges at Braunschweig, Hannover, Bayreuth, Meiningen, Breslau, and Frankfurt am Main.

        French influences played a chief role in the founding of the lodges of the Saxon Polish Marshall Rutowski in Saxony and Bohemia. As already stated, various higher degree organisations penetrated outwards from France and into Germany.

Confusion in the lodges in 18th century Germany

        The conflict of these varying currents caused incredible confusion in the German lodges of the 18th century, climaxing in the Strict Observance of Baron von Hund, the Scottish lodges, the Clermont-Rosachen system, the African Master Architects, the New Goldcrucians And Rosicrucians and many other organisations.

Illuminati

        That political influences were also bound to appear, apart from all enthusiasm for knightly orders and a search for the mysterious, is obvious. Of significance here are the work and efforts of the Rosicrucians under Bischoffswerder and Wцllner, who possessed great influence as Prussian Minister Of State, as well as the Illuminati Order of the Ingoldstadt Professor Adam Weishaupt, who attracted grand attention. Weishaupt was reproached for atheistic and revolutionary tendencies, as well as for connections with the French Revolution. The fact is that Weishaupt, a former Jesuit pupil, built his order on a Jesuitical model, edited a few free spirited books, in which he argued that the Illuminati should gradually occupy all influential offices in order to work for the purposes of the Order. With the help of the Baron von Knigge, he succeeded in considerably expanding the base of his order through Freemasonry. Weishaupt bore the order name Spartacus. At the behest of the Jesuits, who had once again succeeded in gaining influence, the Order Of The Illuminati was prohibited in Bavaria in 1784, and a great many of its members were arrested. Weishaupt nevertheless succeeded in fleeing with the help of his friends. According to Masonic sources, the activities of the Order are said to have ceased in 1785, but rumours persisted according to which zealous activity nevertheless continued, especially during the French Revolution.

Freemasonry In Prussia

        Freemasonry in Prussia developed in a relatively peaceful manner in contrast to the rest of Germany. Nevertheless, the confusion over Strict Observance also affected the oldest of the Prussian Grand Lodges, the Grand National Mother Lodge At The Three Globes. This led to the founding of the Grand State Lodge Of German Freemasons in 1770 by the General Practitioner Johann Wilhelm Kellner von Zinnendorf. In addition, the Royal York de l'Amitie Lodge, founded by French officer prisoners of war, long worked under the Grand Lodge of England. After a change in its ritual by the former Capuchin monk Ignaz Aurelius Fessler, it assumed the name Grand Lodge Of Prussia, or Royal York For Friendship. These three Prussian Grand Lodges, which later referred to themselves as the Old Prussian Lodges, were granted special status under the 1798 edict against secret associations.

        Masonic writings, especially those intended to defend Freemasonry, make frequent mention of the great men of German history and German intellectual life who maintained relations with Freemasonry or who were Freemasons themselves. In addition to Frederick The Great, whose relations to Freemasonry have already been mentioned, these men were mostly the philosophers and writers of German Idealism during the last third of the 18th century, who are depicted as the bearers of true Freemasonry in Masonic texts.

German Idealism of the 18th century

        Freemasons usually also claim that these men received decisive inspiration in the lodges, and that therefore their creative works must be credited to Freemasonry. These Masonic accounts, which are often very skilfully presented, have enticed many undecided racial comrades into Freemasonry, while many opponents of the lodges have gone so far as to attack the great Germans who once belonged to lodges, together with their works, and to describe their membership as intolerable for German intellectual life and German history, without examining the political and cultural conditions of that time.

        A unified Germany, which would have provided these men with a national mission, did not then exist. Many of the numerous princes of the divided Fatherland were anything but ideal representatives of the Nation. The churches were in a state of utter calcification. Dogma prevented any free flight of thought. The natural sciences were the first to free themselves from a stranglehold of compulsion which killed all initiative, and to achieve their most brilliant successes. A second age of Humanism appeared to be dawning, and with it, controversies again arose regarding the education of the entire human race and its higher development.

        The intellectual world of the bourgeoisie of that time had no connection with the present internationalism of Freemasonry. Thinkers felt drawn to all those who, on the other side of the border of their own small German States, held the same views regarding the need to free themselves from the dogma of the churches, and who were sick of doctrinal disputes. At the same time, they opposed the excesses of absolutism. Schiller was never a Freemason, but nevertheless he went through the same development.

        The humanitarian ideal of antiquity had already been fundamentally misunderstood and distorted by Christianity. Now we see Freemasonry take over the same concept and turn it into an ideology denying all Nations and races, in crass contradiction to the racially based concepts of antiquity. In the doctrinal declarations of Freemasonry, insofar as any were issued, this contradiction was, at any rate, not very obvious. To the enlightened spirits of the time, Freemasonry must have appeared to be an ideal merger of the best.

        This is why Frederick The Great, Goethe, Herder, Klopstock, Fichte, Lessing, and many others entered the temple of the lodges. This is how the poetry and artistic productions appeared which are represented by the lodges today as the priceless products of Freemasonry, but which have nothing to do with Freemasonry today.

Change in the meaning of Freemasonry

        What the German intellectuals of the 18th century understood by Freemasonry existed only in their imagination, and was far removed from the actual conditions and objectives of the lodges. Precisely those men who are trotted out today as the star witnesses for the great ideals of Freemasonry soon recognised this, and turned their back on the lodges.

        Frederick The Great took part in no lodge meetings after the first year of his reign (1740), and adopted a critical position against various lodge activities during the last years of his life, wishing them to function as bourgeois social associations only (see his letter of 1779 against the application for titles by Freemasons). Lessing and Fichte left the lodges in anger. The Stolberg brothers quit, and Herder, who entered a lodge in Riga in 1766, never acknowledged himself as a Mason in Weimar. What the General Handbook Of Freemasonry writes about Herder applies to all the great Germans of the time, when it states:

        On the significance, basis, and intent of the association, he built his own system, which he had once wished to propagate.

Goethe and Freemasonry

        That Goethe was not the enthusiastic lodge brother gladly depicted by the Freemasons, is openly admitted by the well known Masonic reference works (General Handbook Of Freemasonry and International Lexicon Of Freemasonry). In 1782, he was, it is true, raised to the Degree of Master and accepted into the Inner Order, but even Masons can make no statements concerning his further participation in the work of the lodge. By the end of 1782, the Weimar lodge closed its doors due to quarrels which broke out due to the confusion of lodges and among the lodge brethren. Goethe's later opinion of Freemasonry is shown by a report written by Goethe in his capacity as Minister Of State for Prince Karl August, when the lodge brothers in Jena filed an application for reinstatement of their lodge in 1807. In it, he stated:

        Freemasonry creates a State within a State. Wherever it is once introduced, the government should attempt to rule it and make it harmless. To introduce it where it has not existed, is never advisable. Even in small towns, such as Rudolfstadt, for example, such an organisation serves a sort of social purpose. Here in Weimar we really don't need it, and in Jena I consider it dangerous, on the grounds mentioned above and for several others as well. Anyone who could immediately imagine the entirety of the membership of which the lodge would consist one half year after confirmation, would consider the matter distressing.

Goethe's report against Freemasonry

        Significantly, these passages are not to be found in either the General Handbook or the International Lexicon, which quote everything that supports Masonic claims. From another text of Goethe dated 1st May 1808, it appears that only Karl August of Sachsen-Weimar insisted upon reopening the Amalia Lodge in Weimar, formally assigning Goethe to introduce the necessary measures. Here, Goethe rather disparagingly calls Freemasonry quasimysteries. With this text, Goethe considered his mission fulfilled, since there is no further information on his participation in lodge work; on the other hand, he addressed a request to the Master Of The Chair of the Amalia Lodge on 5th October, which begins as follows:

        Your Highness would be doing me a special favour if you would deign to count me as absent, in some diplomatic manner not improper to Freemasonry, and suspend me from my duties with regards to the society.

        Goethe's further dealings with the lodge were limited to social politeness. Thus in 1830, upon his appointment to honorary member of the Denkverse Lodge, he sent his reply mostly through the agency of his son August, who entered the lodge in 1815.

        The efforts of the Masons to represent the great Germans of the 18th century as exponents of Masonic spiritual life must be called a falsification of history; since these claims are made against better knowledge, as may be seen from the following quotation from a lodge record of the Grand National Mother Lodge At the Three Globes dated 7th May 1868:

        The complaint that the intelligentsia is withdrawing from the lodges, is not new. Precisely our greatest writers have expressed the same complaint. Herder was a lodge member for a short time; Lessing withdrew after belonging to the association for a few years. Fichte did the same. Goethe maintained a noble reserve, and only participated in the work of the lodge in extraordinary matters, such as the memorial in honour of Wieland, commemoration days, and so on. Schiller never entered the association at all, although, as may be seen from his exchange of correspondence with Kцrner, he was very well informed about the doings and aims of the order. Even Frederick The Great, the founder of our lodge, turned against the order in difference only a few years after entering the order.

The age of the German Wars Of Liberation

        That which is true of the German poets and thinkers at the end of the 18th century, also applies to the German freedom fighters and poets of the Napoleonic age, such as Blьcher, Stein, Gneisenau, Scharnhorst, Schenkendorf, and the others. Even these men gave a new interpretation to Freemasonry in their minds: for them, it became an association of men around great ideas. At the same time, and in the same manner, they distanced themselves from the trite doings of the lodge. The depths of indignity and lack of national honour shown by the lodges in relation to the great national mission is proven by the example of the Frederick For Virtue lodge in Brandenburg, which belonged to the Grand National Mother Lodge At the Three Globes, and which sent a circular letter in 1808 containing the following sentences:

French officers in German lodges

        But how much joy we once again experienced, how many happy hours were ours again, in the temple! How many worthy men and brethren entered our association and paid homage to the illustrious order! In particular, we had the pleasure of initiating several French officers from various regiments for the same lodge, and we thereby hope to have made an important contribution to the propagation of humanity, patience, universal brotherly love, and love of humanity, by uniting some very worthy men closer to us.

        The attached membership list contains the names of 16 French officers among 96 members. This fraternisation with the enemies of their country is all the more repellent when one sees the name of a Prussian Captain alongside the names of the French officers, and learns from the lodge records that the Captain participated in the lodge work along with the French officers.

        French officers in the Napoleonic army, who also allowed themselves to be accepted into other German lodges, apparently acted according to a definite plan, as proven by a French lodge map from the year 1809. In addition to the civilian and military lodges of that time, which are classified according to units and branches of service, the map, in particular, lists the Grand Lodges outside France which were associated with the French Grand Orient, and visits to which were considered advantageous to members of the French army. Under Prussia, the map states: Berlin: Grand National Mother Lodge, called At The Three Globes.

Napoleon

        The question of whether Napoleon I was a Freemason, is disputed even by Freemasons themselves. Clear proof is not available. A variety of evidence indicates that the Corsican belonged to no lodge. Nevertheless, Napoleon appears to have been inspired by the intent to harness Freemasonry for definite political purposes. Thus, he sent the greater part of his marshals into the lodges: Massena, Augerau, Serrurier, Moreau, Kellermann, Mortier, Moncey, Soult, Oudinot, Lefebre, MacDonald, Murat, Ney, Bernadotte (the later King Of Sweden), Perignon, Sebastiani, Lannes, and Poniatowski all belonged to lodges, and in some cases occupied high offices in French Grand Lodges. The former Jacobin Cainbacieres was considered truly his right hand man in these matters, and until 1814, was Grand Master of the Grand Orient Of France, and, from 1806 onwards, Grand Commander Of The Supreme Council Of The Ancient And Accepted Scottish Rite For France. Even the Emperor's two brothers, Joseph and Louis, were Grand Masters of French Freemasonry.

        In his attempts to make the lodges work for him, Napoleon made the mistake of failing to take international Freemasonry into account in his calculations. Thus, a determined enemy arose against him in the English branch of Freemasonry, an enemy which furthermore received support from the Freemasons of all countries oppressed by the Corsican.

        The role played by French Freemasons in the intellectual preparation for the French Revolution of 1789 is no longer disputed by anyone. The Freemasons were, however, swept away in the purge of the radicals in 1792, a fate often suffered by their bourgeois liberal advance troops in later bloody civil upheavals. Nevertheless, the practical results of Revolutionary principles and writings were monstrous, and determined the developments of the following period throughout the world.

Human rights

        Universal human rights were worked out in the lodges of Aachen, propagated at the French convention held on 13th September, 1791, by the Freemason Lafayette, and raised to the fundamental principle of the French constitution in the Declaration Of Human Rights And The Rights Of Citizens.

        These universal human rights, containing the Masonic themes of freedom and equality of all men and the rule of the Folk, to whom those in government are responsible at all times, were proclaimed in America for the first time, and formed the basis for the American constitution. The American independence movement was almost exclusively led by Freemasons. The revolutionary and independence movements in other countries are also known to have been led by Freemasons, who derived their ideas from Paris. In those years, Paris claimed the title of defender of liberty, forming the image of the cultural mission which was to be fulfilled by the Grande Nation.

        The extent to which these views have been retained until the present day is shown by an Open Letter To The French Chamber written by the founder of the Pan European Movement, the Freemason Coudenhove-Kalergi, in 1924. Towards the end, the letter reads as follows:

        Your forefathers hurled three great words into the history of Europe: freedom, equality, fraternity! France brought political freedom to Europe. All the revolutions of the past century were but the echo of the great French Revolution. Renew your mission! Proclaim to the world the outbreak of the third revolution! The revolution of brotherhood! Step forth, with determination, gentlemen, to the forefront of the great movement which is pulsing through Europe, and lead the Europeans through brotherhood to unity! While the Star Spangled Banner of freedom flutters in the American West, while the Red Flag Of Equality flutters in the Russian East, may you in the centre between these two worlds, unfurl the Banner Of Brotherhood, from man to man, from class to class, from Folk to Folk, from continent to continent! Only then can Europe again become the centre of the Earth, and France the centre of Europe!

        Again and again, we see that both main currents of Freemasonry, regardless of their emphatic supranationalism, always attempt to chain the Masonic Internationale to their own countries: just as English Freemasonry serves the purposes of the British Empire, Romanic Freemasonry attempts to chain the Masonic democracies to Paris.

Democracy and Republic

        Even in 1737 and 1741, Ramsay, in his capacity as speaker of the French Grand Lodges, in his groundbreaking speech Speech Of A Grand Master, described the concepts of a universal democratic republic which was to be filled with tolerance. The antimason Abbe Lerudan, who published his well known text attacking Freemasonry The Freemasons Crushed in 1746, pointed out the concepts of liberty, equality, and fraternity -- later actually adopted as the motto of French Freemasonry -- which were the basic principles of this speech.

Louis XVIII

        The demand for democratic forms of government has never since then been abandoned by Freemasonry. With the exception of the English current of Freemasonry, we see the lodges in the opposition wherever the concepts of democracy and the fundamentals of liberalism are violated during the following period. At the same time, it is immaterial whether those who violate these principles are themselves Freemasons. Thus Louis XIV, Louis XVIII, and Charles X all belonged to a Military Lodge Of The Three Brothers United In The Orient Of The Court, French Freemasonry even took a more critical attitude against Kaiser Wilhelm I in 1871, although he was also a Freemason. Napoleon I had made the lodges harmless and, to a certain extent, serviceable to his purposes by skilfully packing them with his confidants. But when, after his death, the lodges were left to their own devices again under Louis XVIII, all dissatisfied republican and democratic elements gathered in the lodges. Pierre Jean de Beranger, who poured biting scorn on the reigning house in his songs, was a Freemason. Decazes, who was called to the head of government and issued a series of liberal regulations, was even a Grand Commandeur Of The Ancient And Revered Scottish Rite in France.

        But the liberal Freemasonic current was once again repressed in favour of the Catholic party, the so called Ultras. Unfortunately, little light is shed on this chapter of French history from the Masonic side, although there are important points of departure for the later developments in Germany, particularly with regard to relations with the Jewish lodge At The Rising Dawn in Frankfurt am Main, and the so called Young Germany movement of Bцrne and Heine.

Charles X

        At the same time, Jewish capital and stock market speculation expanded to such an extent during this period that public life was increasingly dominated by these forces. During the same period, the concept of the liberal bourgeoisie arose in France. The press became the most important tool of this Jewish Masonic clique.

        Thus, the governmental measures of Charles X, directed entirely towards the reestablishment of prerevolutionary conditions, were to a great extent directed towards the suppression of the press.

        At the same time, the struggle was a conflict between two rivals: Freemasons and Catholics. Magnificent demonstrations of Church power took the form of processions moving through the streets of Paris again during this period. But liberal Freemasonry also exploited every opportunity to show its strength. When the deputy General Foy, who had been an enthusiastic Freemason, died in November, 1825, his funeral became just such an event for the liberal bourgeoisie. At the same time, the collections taken up for his widow and children showed the power of the Masonic capital standing behind these efforts: the sums contributed amounted to over one million francs.

        Another occasion was the journey of the old Masonic revolutionary Lafayette, undertaken in early 1830. The lodges put on grand ceremonies in his honour; citizen crowns and triumphal arches decorated the streets in the path of the gigantic triumphal train.

July Revolution of 1830

        It is known that the first victory fell to the liberal opposition through the overthrow of Charles X in the July Revolution of 1830. The Citizen King Louis Philippe mounted the throne, uniting in his person Masonic liberal principles with a truly crafty business sense which led him to be advised by a Paris lawyer, Dupin, a member of the Supreme Council of France, prior to every step he took. But the Citizen King was not enough to satisfy the demands of the liberal opposition in the long run. The conflict finally led to the events of February, 1848. Freemasons participated in great numbers in the peoples' rebellion of Paris. The provisional government formed after the abdication of Louis Philippe included six Freemasons among its ranks, including the Jew Adolphe Isaac Cremieux, who forced the Orleans family to leave France. When the lodge brothers of Paris greeted the new government with a proclamation, Cremieux received the brethren, together with the other Freemasons in the provisional government, and honoured them with an address.

        From now on, French Freemasonry stepped quite openly into the forefront; all leading men in political life stood in some relationship to it.

Napoleon III

        Napoleon III was unable to hinder these developments. His lodge policies aroused the stubborn resistance of the lodge brethren. In the person of Marshall Magnan, he attempted to force a Grand Master upon them who had never been a Freemason. He created an especially dangerous enemy in Cremieux, who united in one person the position of Grand Commander Of The Supreme Council with that of the founder of the all Jewish organisation of the Alliance Isrealite Universelle. Thus, once again, under Napoleon III, the lodges became a hotbed of resistance, in which men like Gambetta, Arago, Minister Of War and Minister Of The Navy in 1848, in addition to Henri Brisson, Jules Ferry, Floquet, Gustave Flourens, later the chief ringleader of the rebellion of the Paris Commune, Jules Simon, Dubost, and many other men who set the tone for democracy and liberalism. When Napoleon III's game was played out in 1871, these same circles went into action, determining the anti German policies of the French government to the present day.

        In Germany at that time, for a variety of reasons, Freemasonry could not point to any such great participation in political events. The negative attitude adopted by the German lodges of the 18th and the early 19th centuries towards the admission of Jews must be viewed as the most important reason. In the 18th century, when the Israelites in Germany were still charged a cattle toll for passage by guards at city gates, the notion that individuals so low on the social scale were to be viewed as brothers with equal rights was, regardless of any philosophical reflections on the matter, simply unthinkable.

Struggle of the Jews for equal rights

        Thus, the activity of the Jews was bound to take the form, initially, of fighting for equal rights in the German Masonic lodges and at the same time in bourgeois society, and then of occupying the key positions in all spheres of public and private life.

Humanitarianism and tolerance on the Jewish Question

        From the beginning of the conflict over the Jewish Question, the tactic, for all parties involved, was to establish the German lodges on the Masonic principles of humanitarianism and tolerance, and then wipe out the concept of differences of religion and race.

        These efforts were encouraged by the fact that Anderson, in the Ancient Duties, had set forth his concepts of humanitarianism and tolerance on a religious basis only. In so doing, he followed the views of his time.

        If Freemasonry really wished to unite members of the most widely varied religious beliefs, it was necessarily forced to advocate the negation of all racial principles.

        The Jewish lodge brethren in England and France, who were already members in full equality of the lodges in both these countries, and who occupied a large proportion of the most important lodge offices, helped the Jews in Germany considerably in these efforts.

        The first attempt was were made in 1749, when three Portuguese Jews reported to the local lodge for a visit. In 1787, the provincial lodge master of Exter spoke out in fundamental agreement with the acceptance of Jewish visitors.

        At the same time, it must be mentioned that the Jews in France and America were engaged in an effort to expand their position in the lodges through the creation of additional higher degree lodge offices. We see this development already a matter of course in the various higher degrees of the Ancient And Accepted Scottish Rite, as well as in the Misraim and Memphis rites.

        In Germany, Jewish efforts were therefore primarily a matter of penetrating the lodges, and in order to do so, any organisation was exploited which could serve as a tool for Jewish interests.

        In the Order Of The Asiatic Brothers, we find, intermixed with a number of German aristocratic names, those of an Isaak Oppenheimer, Hirsch Wolff, Wolff Nathan Liepmann, Jakob Gцtz, Markus Jakob Schlesinger, and others. The Order Master Ecker von Eckhoffen even bore the Order name of Israel. Von Eckhoffen was the author of the text: Can And Should Israelites Be Accepted As Freemasons? It must be assumed that the German aristocrats who thus associated with Jews had fallen into financial dependence on the Israelites, among whom were many money lenders.

1807 Jewish lodge in Frankfurt ain Main

        A fundamental turning point occurred in 1807. Jews gathered together to found a new lodge in Frankfurt am Main in order to:

        Create a temple in Frankfurt am Main under the protection of the Grand Orient of France, the most powerful architect of all worlds.

        This first tolerance lodge, which adopted the name At The Rising Dawn, soon became the entrance tunnel for Jewish Masonic burrowings.

        The famous Ludwig Baruch-Bцrne was a celebrated guest at this lodge and occupied the office of Brother Speaker, while playing a fateful role as a representative of the Young Germany movement along with Heine, pouring his biting scorn on all that was holy in Germany, calling Goethe a doggerelising farmhand, and the German Folk a Nation of flunkies, who fawningly brought back the royal master's lost crown at the call of Go fetch!

        Another member of this lodge was the Jew Gabriel Riesser, also an early fighter for Jewish emancipation, who even became a member of the Constitutional Committee and then Vice President of the Frankfurt National Assembly of 1848.

        Even the Jew Isaak Cremieux visited this lodge in December, 1840, and was honoured with a festival banquet and honorary membership.

        The founders of the Jewish lodge had made themselves secure in both main currents of Freemasonry, the Grand Orient of France and the Grand Lodge of England. They called upon both these bodies for assistance whenever the German lodges caused problems regarding the question of equality.

Complaints to the English Grand Lodge

        In 1819, for example, the Jewish lodge brother Wolf, their representative in the Grand Lodges of London, was assigned the task of filing a complaint with the English Grand Lodge regarding the attitude of the two lodges St. George and Absolom in Hamburg, because both lodges had refused admittance to brethren from the Rising Dawn. In his reply, Brother Wolf reports on his audience with the Grand Master, the Duke of Sussex:

        His Royal Highness remarked: We absolutely refuse to be drawn into any discussion of the alleged reasons; rather, we demand of the lodges in Hamburg that they revoke their decision immediately; should they fail to do so, His Royal Highness will decree that brethren from these Hamburg lodges be forbidden entry into English lodges.

Lodge circular letter of Birkenfeld, 1838

        As a general rule, however, the method of open confrontation was avoided; the technique of issuing commands larded over with false politeness and sociability was much preferred. Neighbourly and friendly dealings were entered into with the other lodges, and attempts were made to win over the opponents. An especially good example of this is the circular letter from the John lodge Fulfilment Of Duty in Birkenfeld in 1838, which contains a report on a visit from the Frankfurt Jewish lodges. The letter reads, among other things, as follows:

        But an experience which provided us with no lesser measure of joy was the visit of the brother delegates from the two right and perfect John lodges At The Rising Dawn and At The Frankfurter Eagle in Frankfurt am Main. We must openly acknowledge that it was solely from a feeling of duty, and in order to comply with the clear prescriptions of the English statutes, that we extended an invitation to these lodges -- of which the grand majority of the members are of the Jewish faith -- as well as to the other lodges in the vicinity. No particular interest could bind us to these men, who are personally quite unknown to us. But the leading personalities among these brethren very quickly succeeded in linking the interests, not only of our lodge brethren, but of all other visitors as well, to universal interests, that we recognised in them, without exception, brethren in the solemn Masonic rite -- worthy, not merely by reason of the laws of the craft, but also by reason of an association created through a sincere desire to enter with us into the chain of brotherhood. When we now find the question of admission of Israelitic Masons everywhere the object of Masonic negotiations over the past year, we thus take the liberty, our beloved brethren, of making a contribution to the resolution of this doubtful matter from our point of view in the present letter. Unless we err, the point of the view of the other lodges which, in emulation of the system of English Freemasonry, recognise the principle that differences in the positive expression of religious belief, unless debased to real atheism, cannot constitute grounds for exclusion from the Masonic association, is that the matter involves an abstract principle only, the concrete application of which could arise in practice only under highly exceptional circumstances. If we take the Jews as they are, as we know them to be, we find few, if any, which we could propose as Freemasons to the best of our knowledge and with a good conscience. This is the conviction of many unprejudiced lodge brethren, who are otherwise able to raise themselves above the power of deeply rooted prejudices. The fact is furthermore undisputed that the isolated position occupied by the Israelites in most parts of Germany very seldom offers the better educated classes an opportunity to come into contact with them and gain a closer view of them from a purely humanistic point of view, other than in very remote areas of conventional life.

        A visit to the two Jewish lodges is then described as follows:

        If I may summarise the experience in both lodges, then I must compare both to the best lodges in our royal craft. For these men, Freemasonry is a joyful temple service of pure religious feeling. If I may now speak of the persons themselves, then both lodges must contain the quintessence of the spiritual and moral notables of the Israelite inhabitants of Frankfurt. I met men who, in their work, certainly deserve to be counted among the noblest of their time, and who are, especially in the field of education and public instruction, leading their religious brethren with giant steps out of the fog of prejudice and into the field of higher light.

        The report continues in this style. The result of this philojewish propaganda was not long in coming. As early as 1845, the lodge Fulfilment Of Duty had the following to report:

Admittance of Jews in Birkenfeld in 1843

        An honourable Israelite in every respect sought admittance to our lodge, and was actually led to the association through our lodge. We have every reason to be pleased with the acquisition of this new brother. We hope in the meantime that the time is not far off when no lodge in Germany will hesitate to accept a freeborn German man of honour and righteousness into the lodge, and to admit him to its work, whatever the differences of denomination or religious conviction.

        This one example speaks for all the rest. That the penetration of the Jews into the German lodges went hand in hand with their penetration into bourgeois society, should be self evident to anyone who knows that Freemasonry in Germany has always been recruited from the highest classes of the bourgeoisie. Thus we find bourgeois society becoming increasingly lacking in instinct against the penetration of Jewry at this time. In the literary salons of the Jewess Rahel Varnhagen, whose husband was a Freemason and enthusiastic follower of the above mentioned Young Germany, Henriette Herz and Dorothy Veit-Schlegel, the wife of the Freemason Friedrich von Schlegel and daughter of Mendelssohn, bourgeois society had a rendezvous with the Jews. As visitors to these salons, we find the brothers Humboldt, Schleiermacher, and the princes Louis Ferdinand of Prussia, in the company of a Heinrich Heine, an Eduard Gans, or a Baruch-Bцrne.

        The lodge At The Rising Dawn even reports proudly:

        As a sign of the respect in which the lodge stood at that time, even in profane Christian circles, we might mention the example of a harmony ball on 20th January, 1849, at which particularly high ranking officers reported their personal participation as shown by 11 documents found in the archives. Of the many military participants, we need only mention the following: General and Supreme Commander von Bechthold, Major and Town Commandant Deetz, First Lieutenant and Adjutant von Scheidlin .....

        The names of 18 other officers, mostly aristocrats, then follow in the report.

The Jews in the German lodges

        It would take us too far afield to describe further developments in detail. The result was that, by the beginning of the 20th century, all German grand lodges accepted Jews as members with equal rights. Only two Old Prussian lodges refused Jews as members, but admitted them as regularly visiting brethren. At the same time, these two grand lodges repeatedly stressed that only their Christian principles prevented them from accepting persons of other beliefs. A baptised Jew could therefore become an equal member of these lodges.

        By the beginning of the 20th century, developments in this respect reached their climax. A broad philosemitism prevailed throughout the highest strata of the bourgeoisie. Fighters for national or racial principles were ridiculed or snubbed. The nobility and bourgeoisie had so lost their instincts in these matters that some of these families were totally destroyed through numerous mixed marriages with Jews.

Encirclement policy against Germany

        It has been already said that French policy from 1870 onwards was determined by liberal and democratic politicians who were all associated with Freemasonry. The results were visible in the encirclement and revenge policy against Germany. Thus, the Freemason Leon Gambetta paved the way for the French Triple Alliance policy as head of the Republican Party. Any expedient, any ally, was acceptable in the struggle against Germany, which had greatly offended the interests of French Masonic democracy. The close alliance with Csarist Russia can only be understood from this point of view. To Edward VII, who led English Freemasonry as Prince Of Wales, these Masonic associations were only too welcome. The Imperial Germany of Wilhelm II was helpless against these international alliances. In particular, an incredible campaign of anti German vilification began in the totally Jewish and Masonic controlled world press, which was only equalled by its successor in the lie campaign against National Socialist Germany. Any clumsy error of Imperial Germany was endlessly exaggerated and exploited by these circles. Masonic slogans and concepts were put into the service of the propaganda of the enemies of Germany. Reference was constantly made to the sabre rattling German militarism which was said to be threatening democracy; the legend of Prussian corpselike obedience was invented, and contrasted to the concepts of Masonic individualism. Pan Germanic barbarism was said to be a danger to all culture and civilisation.

        That the German lodges nevertheless held fast to their ideology of the brotherhood of Folks and Races, and attempted to cover up and excuse the actions of their Romanic and English lodge brethren in the German public eye, was, next to their surrender on the Jewish Question, their one unpardonable sin. While questions of world peace and international solidarity were being discussed at numerous international congresses with the participation of German lodge brothers, the work of the Masonic politicians continued unabated, whose objective was the destruction of Germany. That the influence of French and English power politics played a great role in this development is obvious. Masonic ideological objectives were also equally determinative, however, and were brought to the forefront of Allied propaganda with the slogan of liberating the Folks under monarchical leadership.

        In contrast to the Romanic and English lodge brethren, the German Freemasons neglected their national duties.

Masonic Internationale

        Particularly, the Jewish and small lodges, as well as German Masonic humanitarian Freemasonry, entered fully onto the side of the Internationale liberal democratic Masonic Internationale.

        The equality of Negro lodges was advocated; statements were issued on the Jewish question; international congresses were held with the participation of German lodges, dealing with world Masonic objectives and pacifism.

Recognition of the Negro lodges

        Thus, German Freemasons played a leading role in the struggle for the recognition of coloured lodges, especially lodge brother Findel, a well known Masonic writer and book dealer from Leipzig, who advocated the recognition of Negro lodges.

        Lodge brother Findel received great honours from the Negro lodge in Boston, becoming the representative and intercedant for their claims in all of Europe. The General Handbook has the following to say about Findel:

        Just as he spoke out against the great national lodges in favour of equality for nonchristians, and against the historical foundations and so called traditions of these lodges, Findel also spoke out within the lodges for the recognition of coloured Freemasons in America, as a result of which the Prince Hall Grand Lodge in Boston appointed him honorary Grand Master and General Representative at European Grand Lodges, in which capacity he achieved their recognition by several Grand Lodges on the continent.

        It would be useless to search the archives for tangible proof of direct complicity between Freemasonry and the outbreak of the Great War in 1914. Nevertheless, the lodges of the Entente States declared openly for the Allied cause upon the outbreak of war.

Masonic agitation against Germany

        The Freemasonry of the neutrals was also drawn into this campaign. The Grand Master of the Swiss Lodge Alpina, a former Protestant preacher named Quartier-La-Tente, who also played a political role in his native canton as leader of the educational department, and who was also known in Freemasonry through the founding of the Masonic World Business Office, was especially prominent in the rehashing of atrocity stories and agitating against Germany and the German Army.

        That Italian Freemasonry worked successfully for a political and spiritual rapprochement with France in close coordination with French Freemasonry in the years before the Great War of 1914-18, but carried on violent propaganda in the Italian press after the outbreak of war for Italian entry into the war on the Allied side, are facts of which Italian Freemasons have long been proud, and which they have often admitted.

Masonic congresses during the war

        During the Great War, the Masonic organisations of the Allied powers, as well as those of the neutral States, often held talks and congresses in order to discuss the conditions under which peace should be concluded and proclaimed.

        Especially enlightening in this regard was the meeting of the Masonic Congress Of The Allied And Neutral Nations On The 28th, 29th, And 30th Of June 1917 in Paris, convened by the Grand Orient and the Grand Lodge of France.

        Here, the plan to found a League Of Nations was worked out, discussed, and drawn up; here, the self determination of Folks and the right of the oppressed nationalities of Austria as well as Poland to their independence was discussed; here, the renunciation of Alsace-Lorraine and Trieste was demanded.

        President Wilson, a member of the Order Of Odd Fellows, with similar views, shortly after proclaiming his 14 Points, was sent a telegram of congratulations stating in conclusion that the congress was happy to work with the President on the realisation of this work of international justice and democratic brotherhood, which also reflected the Masonic ideal.

Brother Ohr

        The facts described above, and the attitude of the foreign lodge brothers, had a rather sobering effect on some German Freemasons at the beginning of the Great War. Many were disappointed and disgusted to see the pacifist ideals of Freemasonry, which were supposed to bind the Races and Folks together, so crudely destroyed. The Freemason Ohr, leader of the democratic free student movement in prewar Germany, wrote a brochure at this time entitled: The French Spirit And Freemasonry, in which he discussed the contradictions between German and French Freemasonry.

        This recognition, however, only dawned upon part of the German lodge world. Great numbers of radical Freemasons repeatedly attempted to enter the Masonic international chain of brotherhood, especially towards the end of the Great War, with the help of the neutral lodges.

        Just how far the internationalist attitude of the German lodges really went during the Great War is shown, among other things, by a quote from the Communication From The Association Of German Freemasons in 1917, which states:

        What is at stake is the awakening of internationalist thought in the community of Folks. This work cannot be done by individuals: it must be performed by the existing centres of power, by associations of the most varied colourations.

Field lodges

        The attitude of the German field lodges during the Great War provides an especially sad example. At field march stopping points, German Freemasons created so called field lodges, in which Freemasons from the various Grand Lodges, higher degree Freemasons, and members of humanitarian and Old Prussian lodges, met for lodge work. The extent of this loss of national of dignity is shown by the following documentary evidence from the fullness of lodge materials:

        On 30th August, 1914 -- at a time when even the Social Democrats in Germany were still convinced of the necessity of a victorious pursuit of the war which had been forced upon us, and approved of war credits -- these field lodges sent their Grand Lodges a greeting card describing a meeting with Belgian Freemasons in a Belgian lodge, stating:

        Adolf Hetzel and the following Belgian brothers express their brotherhood, despite war and all else.

        Following the signature of the Belgian Freemasons, the other side of the card says:

        Taken in moving brotherhood during a visit to the lodge in Liege. We send you all hearty greetings. There is still noble humanity despite war.

        It must be mentioned here that the Freemason Hetzel, as Captain and Company Commander in a Regional Storm Battalion, together with the other members of the field lodges, had the colossal tastelessness and lack of dignity to enter a foreign lodge in the uniform of a German Officer, and there to fraternise with Belgian, that is, hostile, lodge members. And this fact was considered significant enough by the participants to be reported to the Grand Lodge in Bayreuth as a particularly Masonic action! There is no indication in the lodge archives that this shameless attitude of German Freemasons during the Great War ever met with the slightest disapproval from the Grand Lodge, or even one single lodge member.

        Just as monstrous is the report on the opening of the field lodge In The Rising Light Of The Somme at St. Quentin on 14th March, 1915, which states:

        The founding of the field lodge was especially difficult due to our peculiar relationship to the French brothers. It is not as if our German brethren who happened to find themselves at St. Quentin in their field grey uniforms would have felt any inner anxiety in fraternising with brethren from the two French lodges; for our part, this occurred in a magnificent, truly Masonic manner from the very outset; to begin with, we even had the repeated joy of having German brethren introduced to us by our French brethren, and hearing them acknowledge themselves to be Masons. The only problem lay in the fact that the French Grand Lodges had broken off Masonic relations with the German Grand Lodges, so that a certain inner conflict arose for the French brethren. When we asked for the temple in the lodge Justice And Truth to be opened and made available to us as a field lodge, this was done absolutely as a matter of course by the French brethren. Doubts only arose regarding the question of possible participation by the French brethren in our work. For our part, nothing stood in the way of such participation, on the contrary.

        The report continues in this vein. It shows clearly and unequivocally to what extent Masonic educational work had corrupted German men; at the same time, it shows that Romanic and English Freemasonry solved their own problems in some different way. While it may perhaps be mistaken to describe the field lodges as exclusively the espionage centres of the lodges of the hostile powers, and to search solely for proofs of actual treason, just the same, it must be clearly obvious that the attitude of the German field brethren -- coupled with constant conformism and submission to defeatist ideals of humanitarianism, tolerance, and pacifism -- was in itself equivalent to consistent treason to the German cause, at a time when the Nation stood in arms against the enemy of the Nation and Folk.

        An observation of Masonic organisation leads to the recognition that, regardless of their total ideological agreement, a multiplicity of Masonic organisations, teaching methods, and systems exist side by side.

John Freemasonry

Council of Officers

Grand lodge

        The lowest level of Masonic organisations, and one which extends all over the world, is represented by the so called John lodge, also described by Freemasons as the Blue or Symbolic lodge. In it, the three degrees of Entered Apprentice, Fellow Craftsman, and Master Mason are granted. These degrees distinguish the members of the lodges with regards to the status of their Masonic education. The leadership of the John lodge, whose preliminary stage, in the event of failure to attain the number of seven members in the Master Degree, is the Masonic Garland , lies in the hands of the so called Council Of Officers, is recruited from among the most active members (Master Of The Chair, 1st and 2nd Overseer, Speaker, Secretary, his representative, and so on.). The John lodges of a certain area -- perhaps a country -- are merged into a Grand Lodge, whose task, in addition to purely administrative matters, is the maintenance of international relationships and associations with the Grand Lodges of other countries, as well as safeguarding the primarily uniform content of Masonic educational work, and the powerful coordination of all Masonic efforts, especially Masonic activities outside the lodge. It is also responsible for arranging international lodge congresses and meetings.

Ideological unity of world Freemasonry

        John Freemasonry is -- since its organisation and expansion, symbolism, ritual customs, teaching content, working methods, and objectives all agree with each other regardless of any very minor deviations -- a worldspanning, ideologically determined unit, which, though not in the sense of organisationally rigid coordination -- justifies the term World Freemasonry.

Higher degrees

        Freemasonic organisations all over the world grant -- in addition to the three degrees of the John lodges, accompanied by a continual and strict selection of their members -- additional Masonic degrees, which are valued and designated as higher degrees regardless of the name -- Higher Degrees, Recognition Degrees, Inner Orient, Close Associations, and so on. These higher degrees are mostly granted by separate Masonic associations, and represent a selection of Masonic activists who have already distinguished themselves during their membership in the degrees of John Freemasonry through their interest in, and enthusiasm for, Masonic activity.

Higher degree system

Swedish system

Memphis Rite

Misraim Rite

Mixed Rite

        There are a great many different higher degree systems, which exhibit no major differences in content and objectives. The best known are: the Swedish system, with 10 or 11 degrees (first granted in the Grand Lodge Of Sweden, and also granted in one Grand Lodge each in Denmark and Norway, as well as formerly in one Grand Lodge in Germany); the system of the Grand National Mother Lodge At the Three Globes in Berlin, with 7 degrees; the system of the Grand Lodge Of Prussia For Friendship in Berlin, with 5 degrees; the system of the Memphis and Misraim Rite, with 97 or 90 degrees; the 33 degree system, spanning the entire world, of the International Mixed Masonic Order Of Human Rights which dedicated itself chiefly to the emancipation of women and, in contradistinction to all other Masonic systems, accepts men and women without distinction.

33 degree system

        The best known, due to its political significance, is the 33 degree system of the Ancient And Accepted Scottish Rite, whose members are merged into a so called Supreme Council and are especially strictly selected from the point of view of Masonic activism. According to binding articles adopted at a world congress of this Supreme Council, only one such Supreme Council may exist in every country in the world; the only exception is the United States Of America. There, where this type of Freemasonry has arisen with decisive Jewish membership, there are two such Supreme Councils, side by side. 36 Supreme Councils were active in early years, but the figure has fallen considerably over the past few years, due to antimasonic measures in Europe. The fact that its members include important personalities in political and intellectual life in all countries, and that Jews hold a large percentage of memberships in this branch of Freemasonry, which is characterised by an especially radical realisation of Masonic ideals, gives the Supreme Council considerable significance, especially in politics.

Elementary school and higher degree of Freemasonry

        Though higher degree Freemasonry, as a centre of particular Masonic activity, even appears to have begun to lead a life of its own in some respects, the closest relationships and associations still exist with John Freemasonry. These relationships are primarily assured by the fact that members of the higher degree remain active in the degrees of John Masonry at all times and perform most of the lodge leadership, thereby ensuring that the aims of higher degree Masonry are jointly implemented by the broad mass of John Masons. The symbolic degree (that is, the degree of John Freemasonry) is the Masonic elementary school, while the higher degree is the Masonic high school, the already mentioned Swiss Mason Quartier-la-Tente once remarked in a discussion on the nature of higher degree Masonry.

World Freemasonry

        In its basic objectives, Freemasonry is directed towards the creation of a supranational Masonic world organisation, a universal Freemasonry, as the preliminary step towards a common bond of humanity, the Masonic world republic. Various factors which cannot be listed here hindered the attainment of this goal, which was only partially achieved even during the glittering age of Freemasonry.

Masonic World Business Office

International Masonic association

International Congress

        Around the turn of the century under Swiss and French leadership, a series of Grand Lodges were moved to create a Masonic World Business Office under the leadership of the already mentioned Swiss Freemason, Quartier-la-Tente. Out of this organisation, after the Great War of 1914-1918, arose the International Masonic Association, which included more than 30 Grand Lodges from Europe and Central and South America. Under French leadership, this Masonic world association -- in which German grand lodges were also prepared to participate -- carried on zealous political activity, which found its expression after 1933 in sharp attacks on National Socialist Germany. Delegates from the member grand lodges met at 3 year intervals at International Masonic Association congresses, which served to combine the forces of the member grand lodges in a powerful manner, especially in politics. Implementation of the resolutions adopted at these meetings was the responsibility of two committees: the Consultative Committee and the Executive Committee of the International Masonic Association.

        Arising from a Masonic Esperanto association, the General Masonic League (Universale Framasona Ligo, U.F.L.), represented a supranational merger of individual Freemasons from every country in the world, which were merged into national groups in every particular case. Even in Germany, there was one such national group, with a large proportion of Jewish members. In keeping with the objective -- intensified Masonic efforts in all professions -- the members were merged into so called professional groups: for example, Masonic doctors, Masonic war veterans (objective: weakening the spirit of national defence through pacifist teachings), Masonic teachers (intensification of pacifist doctrines, destruction of national military traditions). International meetings worked for the uniform establishment and coordination of Masonic front work.

Confederation of Lausanne

        In the higher degree Freemasonry of the Scottish Rite (33 degree freemasonry), there is also a supranational merger organisation known as the Confederation Of Lausanne. Its objective, for this branch of Freemasonry, is the same as the International Masonic Association for the Grand Lodges of John Freemasonry.

        Until the complete suppression of Masonic activity in Germany in 1935, a multiplicity of Masonic organisations were active, which, despite many external differences, exhibited an extremely broadbased agreement with regards to ideological fundamentals. This multiplicity of associations existing independently and side by side was a result of the political and historical development of the German Reich, and cannot be discussed here.

Old Prussian Grand Lodges

        With 50,000 members, the three Old Prussian Grand Lodges are the most important Masonic associations in Germany in terms of numbers. To this group belonged:

        -- The Grand National Lodges Of German Freemasons in Berlin, which adopted the additional designation Grand Christian Order after the elections of September, 1930 (due to the great increase in votes obtained by the Nationalist Movement!) and attempted to disguise itself entirely after 30th January, 1933, by calling itself simply the German Christian Order, claiming to have renounced its Masonic character. Its membership consisted of at least 20,000 members in one Highest Order Chapter (10 degrees with approximately 300 members), 19 Order Chapters (6 to 9th degree), 54 Andrew Lodges (4 and 5th degrees), and 180 John Lodges (1st to 3rd degrees). These grand lodges worked on the so called Christian principle, that is, admittance was dependent upon membership in a Christian church. It was however not particularly antijewish, as they, and their members, would gladly have us believe; rather, it admitted baptised Jews at all times.

        -- The Grand National Mother Lodge At The Three Globes in Berlin, which changed its name to the National Christian Order Of Frederick The Great for camouflage purposes after 30th January, 1933, also pretended to have renounced its Masonic character. Its membership consisted of approximately 21,000 members in 20 Inner Orients (5th to 7th degrees), 94 Scottish Lodges (4th degree), and 183 John Lodges (1st to 3rd degrees). Here, as well, membership in a Christian church was a requirement of membership: baptised Jews could not be excluded from admittance. Powerful elements also advocated equality of admittance even for religious Jews, without, however, attaining the two thirds majority of votes required by the statutes of the Grand Lodges Association.

        -- The Grand Lodge Of Prussia For Friendship (also formerly known as the Royal York For Friendship) in Berlin, similarly attempted to disguise itself as the German Christian Order For Friendship, also claiming to have abandoned its Masonic character. Its membership consisted of approximately 9,000 members in one Innermost Orient (5th degree), 23 Inner Orders (4th degree) and 108 John Lodges (1st to 3rd degrees). With regard to the admittance of Jews, the fundamental principle was changed several times. For a while, Jews were admitted without restriction. Under the pressure of the racial struggle against Freemasonry, however, they made admittance dependent upon membership in a Christian church (with a heavy heart). But even years after this new regulation -- even after 30th January, 1933 -- many Mosaic Jews were among its members.

        For purposes of uniform establishment of coordinated Masonic activity, especially with a view to defence against attacks, representatives of these three Grand Lodges were merged into the Old Prussian Grand Master Association.

Humanitarian grand lodges

        In addition, there was the group, which united 6 grand lodges, of the so called Humanitarian Grand Lodges, which granted only the 3 degrees of the John Lodges, but which also recognised a type of higher degree in the Close Associations. Though this group was far from comparable to the Old Prussian lodges in terms of numbers of members, there is no doubt that it contributed much more significantly to the destruction of German racial substance through its greater activism, since the proportion of racially Jewish members was considerably greater, varying according to the grand lodges involved. To this group belonged:

        -- The Grand Lodge At The Sun in Bayreuth, with approximately 3300 members in 41 lodges;

        -- The Grand Freemasonic Lodge For Concord in Darmstadt, with 900 members in 20 lodges;

        -- The Grand National Lodge Of Saxony in Dresden, with 6,000 members in 47 lodges, which attempted to turn its coat in National Socialist Germany after 30th January, 1933, calling itself the German Christian Order Of Saxony;

        -- The Grand Lodge German Chain Of Brotherhood in Leipzig, with approximately 1,800 Freemasons in 10 lodges, which took the camouflage name Christian Order German Dome after 30th January, 1933;

        -- The Grand Mother Lodge Of The Eclectic Association Of Freemasonry in Frankfurt am Main, with 25 lodges and approximately 2,500 members, which had an unusually high percentage of Jewish members; and finally

        -- The Grand Lodge Of Hamburg in Hamburg, whose provincial lodge in Berlin only arose due to the crossover of members with Jewish racial origins. This Grand Lodge had 54 lodges (including 14 in foreign countries) with approximately 5,000 members.

        In addition to the Old Prussian and Humanitarian Grand Lodges -- which called each other mutually recognised lodges -- other Masonic grand associations and individual lodges (corner lodges) were active in Germany, to whom recognition was refused by the Old Prussian and Humanitarian Grand Lodges on competitive and political grounds, but which possessed the recognition (that is, acknowledgment of Masonic status) of foreign Masonic organisations, due in part to initiatives by foreign Freemasons.

        This group included the Freemasons League At The Rising Sun (independent lodge), with headquarters in Nьrnberg or Hamburg, with approximately 1,250 members in 50 lodges, which granted the three grades of John Freemasonry and cooperated very closely with French Freemasonry. Politically, these Freemasons' associations were oriented towards the political left. In 1932, their members were encouraged to enter the Iron Front in order to serve humanity.

Superior Council for Germany

        A number of members from these Grand Lodges joined French lodges in order to obtain the higher degrees of Freemasonry, founding the Supreme Council For Germany, with approximately 270 members in 16 higher degree lodges characterised by their particular political activism. The 4th degree was granted in 5 perfection lodges, the 18th degree in 7 chapters, the 30th degree in 3 Areopagen Lodges, and the 33rd degree was granted in one Supreme Council.

Symbolic Grand lodges of Germany

        Reasons internal to Freemasonry which cannot be discussed here led to the founding of the Symbolic Grand Lodge Of Germany, which was associated by agreement with the Supreme Council For Germany, and granted the degrees of John Masonry (1st to 3rd degrees) in 28 lodges with approximately 800 members. After The Leader's accession to power, the leading Jewish members of this grand lodge emigrated to Palestine and continued to lead the Symbolic Grand Lodge Of Germany In Exile in Tel Aviv.

Association of German Freemasons

        The coordination and establishment of common Masonic work was aided by the German Grand Lodge Association, an association of various Grand Lodges, and the Association of German Freemasons with headquarters in Leipzig, a merger association of individual Freemasons from the various German Grand Lodges, primarily dedicated to Masonic work (Masonic cultural work).

Universal Masonic League

        The supranational Universal Freemasonic League was represented by one German national group.

        Officially, Freemasonry was forbidden in Austria until 1918, but continued to exist in the form of humanitarian associations, so that the Grand Lodge Of Wien was able to open for business with 14 lodges in 1918. The number of members had risen to 1,300 in 22 lodges when an end was put to its lodge activity in 1938.

Supreme Council for Austria

        Higher degree Freemasonry was represented by the Supreme Council For Austria (33 degree Masonry), whose leader for years was the Jew Eugene Lenhoff. An extraordinarily great number of Jews were active in it, as in the Grand Lodge Of Wien.

Universal Masonic League

        Here as well, a national group called the Universal Masonic League was very active, led by Jews.

Masonic Grand Lodge of Lessing At the Three Rings

        As in Austria, Masonic organisations were camouflaged as secret humanitarian associations (camouflage name for the prohibited Masonic lodges). In 1918, the Masonic Grand Lodge of Lessing At The Three Rings was created with headquarters in Prague, working in the German language with approximately 1,400 members in 30 lodges, mostly Germans and Jews (up to 60 percent of all lodge members were members of the Jewish race), granting the 3 degrees of John Freemasonry.

National Grand Lodges of the Czechoslovakian Republic

        In close cooperation with the Czechoslovakian underground during the 1914-18 War, a purely Czechoslovakian oriented Freemasonry arose under the name of National Grand Lodge Of The Czechoslovakian Republic, with headquarters in Prague and approximately 1,200 members in 25 lodges. This Masonic organisation recruited exclusively from the ranks of the chauvinistic Czechoslovakians, and possessed, like the Supreme Council For The Czechoslovakian Republic with which it worked in close cooperation (through the Supreme Council) as well as with international higher degree Freemasonry, possessing extraordinarily significant political influence through very close personal relationships in all branches of the Czechoslovakian government and administration, as well as in intellectual life.

The Bridge

        In addition, there was a third Grand Lodge, which was first called the Masonic Grand Lodge The Bridge, and later, the Grand Orient Of Czechoslovakia.

League Of German Masonic Lodges In Poland

        In the German territories, now reincorporated into the German Reich, a number of Masonic lodges were active during the German period (until 1918), and merged themselves into the League Of German Masonic Lodges In Poland since they were required to sever their relations with the Reich at the request of the Polish Government.

Odd Fellows

        In addition, two Polish Masonic bodies were also active: the National Grand Lodge Of Poland and the Supreme Council For Poland. No concrete information was gathered as to their membership or the number of their lodges.

        In addition to the organisations understood by the term Masonic, a great many organisations and associations overlap with Freemasonry in their ideological principles, are very tightly related to it, or are closely associated with it through tight personal relationships. These associations and merger organisations are called organisations similar to Freemasonry, a designation which is all the more justified since, in many cases, their spiritual relationship to Freemasonry is confirmed by these organisations themselves.

        The most significant of these organisations in terms of numbers (over 2 million members were counted after the Great War of 1914-1918) is the Independent Order Of Odd Fellows (U.O.O.F.), with an international leadership located in the USA. The Odd Fellows were represented in Germany with approximately 8,000 members in more than 250 lodges. In former Austria, former Czechoslovakia, and former Poland, there were also independent lodges, with very high rates of Jewish membership, as in Germany. The Independent Order Of Odd Fellows grants 4 degrees and 3 higher degrees, which are called Camp Degrees; it also accepts women as members in the Rebecca Lodges. Due to its similarities with Freemasonry, the Order Of Odd Fellows, which, like the Order Of Druids -- which should also be mentioned -- recruits its membership mostly from the middle class and the liberal professions, and is often called the Freemasonry of the little man.

The Order Of Druids

        With regards to humanitarian attitudes, the Order of Druids, (United Ancient Order Of Druids) may be mentioned, with approximately 12,000 members in Germany, united in so called Groves, and which also recruited from the middle classes and commercial trades. After 30th January, 1933, the association attempted to disguise itself as the German Folkish Brotherhood, describing itself as the guardian of Celtic Germanic heritage.

Schlaraffia

        In outward expansion, ceremony, and in the division of degrees, the 35,000 members of the Schlaraffia (also called All Schlaraffia, with headquarters in Prague), with 6,500 members in the Old Reich, exhibits similarities with Freemasonry, which are enhanced by their cultivation of the concept of brotherhood and by neutrality on the racial question. Considerable Jewish membership, as well as numerous personal relationships with Freemasonry, with the consequent possibility of Masonic ideological influence, justify National Socialism's negative attitude towards this association as well.

Rotary International

        Rotary International (Rotary Club), which sprang up around the turn of the century in the U.S.A. and which has since spread all over the world under American leadership, is a modern type of Freemasonry. Rotary Club districts were represented even in Germany, Austria, in former Czechoslovakia, and former Poland, assigning themselves the task of cultivating international culture and economic relationships. Due to its neutral attitude on racial, political, and religious matters, reflecting its Masonic fundamentals, and due to its propagation of internationalistic thought, and not least due to its personal relationships with Jewry and Freemasonry, the Rotary Club must also be viewed negatively by National Socialism.

Closely related expedient creations of Freemasonry

        It has already been stated that it contradicts the nature of Masonic activity to allow Masonic organisations to attract attention through open action -- especially of a political nature -- even though many Masonic documents and testimonies are available to prove the existence of such actions. To achieve its ideals and objectives, Freemasonry has created front organisations which are not outwardly recognisable as Masonic, but which must be considered the expedient creations of Freemasonry, in addition to the great merger associations of individual members from the most varied lodges. Thus the governing bodies of welfare institutions, trade associations, educational institutions, academic bodies, public educational organisations, and so on, were filled with a great many Freemasons, who took care that the Masonic ideology reached the broadest segments of the population.

        Cooperation with nearly all supranational associations, such as the Esperanto Club, the Universal League For Human Rights, the Association Of Friends Of The New Russia, the German Peace Society, the Society Of Friends, the German Association For The League Of Nations, the Bluntschli Committee, the German Free Association, Universal Brotherhood, the League For Inner Peace, and the League For The Promotion Of Humanity, can be proven on the basis of documents, and was actively pursued in accordance with the aims of the lodges. For the most part, these same organisations, only a few of which can be mentioned here, were founded by Freemasons and Masonic committees.

Pan European Movement

        An example of the prevailing spirit of these organisations and their Masonic founders may be found in the Pan European Movement of the Viennese higher degree Freemason Coudenhove-Kalergi. This movement worked for the merger of all European Nations into a Federal State, called the Pan European Union. As the movement took on greater proportions, Coudenhove-Kalergi withdrew from his Viennese lodge as a tactical cover, to avoid implicating the lodge in his political activity.

        In 1925, Coudenhove-Kalergi wrote the following sentences in his article Practical Idealism:

Eurasian Negroid mongrel race of the future

        The Mankind of the future will be a racial mongrel. Today's races and castes will fall before the increasing overcoming of space, time, and prejudice. The Eurasian Negroid race of the future, outwardly similar to the ancient Egyptians, will replace the multiplicity of Folks through a multiplicity of personalities.

        The text Nobility, published in 1924, says of the Jews on page 39:

Jews form a new race of nobility

        Thus finally, out of all these persecutions, a small community arose, hardened to steel by a heroically borne martyrdom of the spirit, and purified of all elements weak of will or poor of spirit. Instead of annihilating Jewry, persecution has ennobled Europe despite itself through an artificial selection process, raising the Jews to the leading Nation among all Folks. No wonder then that this Folk, sprung from the ghetto, has become a spiritual nobility in Europe. Thus has a kind Providence given Europe a new race of nobility and spiritual graces through the emancipation of the Jews, when the feudal nobility fell apart.

        The demand for a great supranational Federation Of States, whose members would represent a barren racial mongrelism, and in which only the race of nobility of spiritual graces, the Jew, would be allowed to remain pure, is the uttermost consequence of the Masonic ideology.

        The Grand Lodge Of Wien went enthusiastically to work for the Pan European Union in a call to all Masonic chief authorities. Even the Masonic newspaper The Beacon enthused about the thoughts of the higher degree Freemason Coudenhove-Kalergi, and stated in March, 1925:

        Freemasonry, especially Austrian Freemasonry, may be eminently satisfied to have Coudenhove-Kalergi among its members. Austrian Freemasonry can rightly report that Brother Coudenhove-Kalergi fights for his Pan European beliefs: political honesty, social insight, the struggle against lies, striving for the recognition and cooperation of all those of good will. In this higher sense, Brother Coudenhove-Kalergi's program is a Masonic work of the highest order, and to be able to work on it together is a lofty task for all brother Masons.

        The most contradictory declarations are made regarding the principles of Freemasonry by lodge organisations and leading Freemasons. One of these basic principles states that:

        Freemasonry strives to encourage, in a manner reflecting the customs of the early lodges, the moral ennoblement of Man, and human happiness in general. (Declaration of the Grand Lodge Of Hamburg.

        The Freemason Ludwig Schroeder declared:

Principles of Freemasonry

        Freemasonry strives to become the link of faith and mutual good will between men, a link which would otherwise be relegated to an eternally distant future, due to religious beliefs, educational prejudices, and national circumstances.

Principles of Freemasonry

        This declaration concords perfectly with the statements of Reverend Anderson's Ancient Duties. The constitution of the national Grand Lodge Of Prussia For Friendship states, in paragraph IV of the General Principles:

        Class, nationality, colour, religious recognition, and political opinions should in no way hinder acceptance, just as differences in skin colour or race should not be a bar to the recognition of a lodge or grand lodge.

        Thus, the aim is to achieve an international association of humanity beyond race and nationality. Freemasons are proud that Negroes, the yellow races, and Jews are to stand with equal rights next to the white man in this universal chain of brotherhood.

Humanitarianism ideal of Freemasonry

        All men are equal in the humanitarian ideal of Freemasonry. The old edition of the Universal Handbook Of Freemasonry says of this Masonic ideal:

        Humanity refers to all men. It means universal love, which rises above all differences and divisions of humanity: it doesn't inquire about racial or religious community. It views and honours in every racial and religious comrade -- Man, a being of the same species, with equal rights, the related brother of the same genus. Man's life may be viewed from two viewpoints: as individual life and as social life: Man lives as an individual being and as a member of a commonwealth. The model image of the individual life is humanity, mankind; the model image of social life is cosmopolitanism, citizenship of the world. Freemasonry was created for this highest model of the life of humanity, for the encouragement of humanity and of world citizenship; the association of Freemasonry is a humane and cosmopolitan society.

        Uninhibited individualism in personal as well as in political and economic relationships is one of the consequences of the Masonic ideology. In the ritual of the 30th degree, it is expressly stated that the aims of the dictators, which, of course, would restrict the rights and self determination of the individual, must be fought. There is no thought of subordinating personal advantages and interests to the good of a Folk Community. The right of the individual goes before all else.

        The manifestations and ideas of bourgeois liberalism are for the most part anchored in Freemasonry. The form of government reflecting Freemasonry is the democratic republic.

Educational objectives

        Freemasonry describes its educational objectives with the following symbol: it claims to be building the great temple of all humanity. The material for this construction is represented by individual men, which must be hewn accordingly by Freemasonry, so as to fit into the construction of the temple. The model and symbol for this construction is the building of Solomon's Temple.

        The rough, unhewn stone, representing Man upon his entrance into the lodge, must be hewn into a perfect cube, so as to fit smoothly and perfectly into the place assigned to it during construction by the plans of the master.

        Thus have the Freemasons themselves fittingly described the effects and methods of their education. To them, education is not a matter of developing and encouraging the capacities inherent in a given type or race. Man is to be hewn: that is, important characteristics of his character are to be effaced forever.

        Nor is it, therefore, of any importance to Freemasonry which Folk or Race the individual lodge brother belongs to, since the educational result is to be the same identically smooth cube.

        This mutilation of the character and personality makes men capable of manipulation even in the absence of any orders from the lodge. A man who has subordinated himself must and will think and act like a Freemason of his own will in determined situations.

Effects and methods of Freemasonic education

        Four factors support and guide Masonic educational work. In the first place are the cultish activities of the Freemasons, exactly prescribed in so called rituals, in custom. In the first three degrees of the so called John lodges, this ritual is the same all over the world.

Ritual

        We might note that Freemasonry, which arose during the age of rationalism and the Enlightenment as a counterpoise to the Church, has never renounced recourse to the methods used by churches. It too, summons forth a spiritual openness among its members through external ritualistic actions; it, too, attempts to stupefy the critical powers of the intellect through the solemn atmosphere of a temple service, manipulating the emotions of the intimidated participants.

        The shimmer of candlelight, organ music, ceremonial costumes, secret drawings and signs, magnificent volumes and symbols, are all intended to take the mind prisoner.

        At the same time, Freemasons are aware that their whole cult would dissipate into a ridiculous travesty in the cold light of day: they have therefore withdrawn their temple and their rituals from the view of the profane out of fear.

        The decisive truth, however, is that the ritualistic content of these customs and their symbolism is derived entirely from Jewish and Near Eastern sources. It therefore seems odd that the lodge brothers should repeatedly attempt to depict their Near Eastern cult as the Sun Cult of Germanic heritage.

Symbolism

        The symbols and images of Freemasonry are closely bound up with ritualistic actions. While cultish activities and ritual may be viewed as encouraging the atmosphere and setting the scene for Masonic work, the symbolism itself occupies an overproportionally great share of the educational work of the lodges. Symbolism communicates Masonic principles in a penetrating and visible manner.

        In the gradual, step by step education of Freemasons, it is important to be able to modify and deepen the significance of the images as needed, and according to the degree of Freemasonry involved. Moreover, the symbols bring an atmosphere of secrecy into the temple.

        By far the greater number of these images and educational symbols relate to the symbol of Jehovah and the Temple Of Solomon. The number of references to the Old Testament, to Hebrew words and customs, to the cabbalist numerological mysticism and concepts which make up Masonic lore, is very great.

        Of the Jewish legendary material and Old Testament concepts and tales which play a role in Freemasonry, only a few can be mentioned here: building the Tower Of Babel, building Solomon's Temple, the legend of Hiram. Hebrew words and inscriptions of Freemasonry include, among others: Adonai, Yahweh-Jehovah (as a Hebrew tetragrammaton), Tubulkain (Lord Of Creation -- Lord Of The Earth), Shibboleth (Judges XII:5 and 6) Jakin (1st degree), Boas (2nd degree), Mac benac (3rd degree). The following Jewish symbols play a particularly important role: the working carpet as the symbol of the Temple Of Solomon; the two pillars from the forecourt of the Temple; Jakin and Boas; Solomon's Golden Crown; the seven armed candlestick; the Ark Of The Covenant; the Tables Of The Law; the table with unleavened bread; the altar with the smoking incense; the Acacia branch; Hiram's coffin; and the six pointed star (Mogen David -- Star of David).

        These are the Jewish customs and symbolism which were thought indispensable by German men of our time in the education of their lodge brethren. As late as 1931, a so called National Grand Lodge considered these matters thoroughly, and came to the conclusion that no changes should be made in these customs. A circular letter from the Grand National Mother Lodge At The Three Globes in October, 1931, stated:

Salvation comes from the Jews

        The desire was expressed that the Bible in the antechamber should no longer be opened to John IV. The XXIInd verse of this chapter reads: Ye know not what ye pray to, but we know what we pray to: since salvation comes from the Jews. These passages were considered dubious, and the fear was expressed that the John Masters who were to be consecrated might take offence at it. After thorough examination, the Ritual Committee came to the conclusion that John IV must be retained, and the Ancient Scottish Directorship shared this opinion.

        This same Grand Lodge proved its dishonesty a year later when it caused its temples to be depicted in a large illustrated newspaper draped with national flags, as abodes of racial and national celebration.

The working carpet

Symbols

        Among the essential educational symbols, the so called working carpet is of foremost importance. This is the central point of the lodge, on which are depicted the lodge ornaments (Masonic designation for symbols and educational images), tools, and other images. The carpet bears an image of the Temple Of Solomon, and differs according to the degree for which it is intended. In the 1st and 2nd degrees of the John lodge, it depicts the forecourt of Solomon's Temple with the two pillars, Jakin and Boas. According to legend, the apprentices and journeymen employed in the construction of Solomon's Temple gathered by these two pillars on payday to receive their wages, which were paid upon the correct password.

        Therefore, the entered apprentices gather in the lodge temple under the first overseer at the corner of the carpet depicting the pillars of Jakin. At the pillar of Boas stand the fellow craftsmen, under the supervision of the second overseer. Jakin and Boas are also the words of recognition for the degrees of Entered Apprentice and Fellow Craftsman. Above the apprentice pillar, the hewing of the rough stone is depicted by a stone cutter's hammer being applied to the stone, while the finished hewn stone is visible above the fellow craftsman pillar. Around the carpet and on it, the apprentice, fellow craftsman, and master undertake three symbolic journeys upon their consecration and promotion.

        Other important symbols are: the three great lights of Freemasonry, the Bible, T-square, and compass. The pedestals of Freemasonry are wisdom, strength, and beauty, while the three small lights represent the sun, moon, and the Master Of The Chair. The tool with which the Master Of The Chair directs the lodge is the hammer. The Master opens and closes the work with three hammer blows.

        The meaning of the individual symbols cannot be given here, since any explanation would require a work of several volumes. To Freemasons, every individual image is the visible symbol of certain teachings and far reaching philosophical concepts. On the meaning of the symbolism of the apprentice's carpet alone, there is, in addition to many other works, a two volume work by a lodge brother named Gloede, entitled The Order Science, Developed On The Apprentice's Carpet. Even the Freemason Gloede confirms that the Cabbala, with its numerical mysticism and numerological symbolism, and the Gematria contained in the Cabbala, plays the chief role in Masonic custom.

        Regarding these symbols, the International Lexicon Of Freemasonry by Lennhoff-Posner says:

        Symbolism works by association, chiefly as a means of inner organisation. Elsewhere, it has been indicated that the Masonic association is not a worldly one, in the sense of a body with uniform leadership. Nevertheless, there is a symbolic connection. Its bridge is the common constructional symbolism. The educational image of building the Temple is, for the most part, understood by all Freemasons in the same manner, no matter how different the working methods of individual Masonic groups may be. Symbolism facilitates the spiritual work of the lodge through its visibility, permitting hidden worlds to open up which would otherwise remain closed. It smooths the spiritual stages of development, and creates an atmosphere of uniformity of thought, which an association as broadly based as the Masonic one necessarily requires.

        Here we clearly perceive the principle of an intellectual levelling of the brothers of the Earth through Masonic symbolism. The old edition of the Universal Handbook Of Freemasonry says:

        Freemasonry possesses a language in its forms which is understood by all the Folks of the Earth. Let Hurons and Araucana, Yakuts and Malays, Berbers and Kaffirs, enter our halls, and they will be vividly struck by the solemnity and dignity of the living fullness and spiritual beauty of our symbols, customs, and decorations, and will understand inwardly. They will joyfully join our chain.

        The Handbook then introduces a text entitled: The Three John Degrees Of The National Mother Lodge At The Three Globes, quoting the following sentence:

        Let initiate Freemasons never forget that almost every symbol has a dual meaning: a moral one, and a mysterious one.

        The content of their moral meaning can be passed over. But the Handbook's remarks on the mysterious meaning of the symbols are instructive, because they provide an insight into the educational and teaching methods of Freemasonry with a clarity which is usually lacking in Masonic writings. It says:

        The mysterious meaning of the symbols has another purpose. It relates partly to the inner substance, and partly to the history of the association. The apprentice receives significant glimpses only, but never a complete explanation, because even the smallest symbol can be developed or understood completely without including everything. The studious, true, and virtuous brother will be given the necessary instruction by his master with every additional step he takes. At the correct time, in one single explanation, a vantage point will be opened to him from which he can obtain an overview of the hidden meaning of every symbol, and their secret relationships, without difficulty, and without danger of error.

        The apprentice should keep the following in mind above all else:

 

1.      All actions performed in the lodge are exactly prescribed. To the small minded, this may easily seem a mere game, or at least an empty formalism: why should actions which may appear insignificant in themselves be subordinated to a solemn norm?

2.      The mysterious hieroglyphics and customs often possess more than one meaning. Someone who has learned perhaps one meaning only, therefore, should not imagine that he need pay no further attention to it. Another meaning may be made known to him in a higher degree, which had perhaps never occurred to him. This is neither arbitrary nor inconsistent, but rather, a manner of procedure which is thoroughly calculated based on the nature of the material and the nature of men's minds.

3.      To the alert observer, much may seem contradictory in the symbols. But even this is deliberately intended; it results from the necessity of leading the pupil forward in our association in a gradual manner, sharpening his powers of observation, and exercising his tenacity of patience.

        These sentences contain everything we need to know about the purpose of the symbols. We clearly perceive the manner in which the apprentice is gradually brought closer to the aims of the lodge. The passage stating that the symbols are deliberately intended to be full of contradictions, and that the pupil should be encouraged to reflect upon their meaning, is very instructive. Two goals are attained through this tactic: at one and the same time, a selection can be made between the brothers who are satisfied with the official meaning, and thus prove themselves unsuitable for lodge purposes -- these brothers remain in the lower ranks -- and those who go further and, using the lodge library, attempt to clarify the mystery, proving that they have understood the meaning of Masonic self education in this realm as well. They cannot fall into error, because the true meaning of the symbol points in a definite direction only. The second advantage obtained through this tactic by the lodge is that it is covered against attacks by outsiders at all times, in that reference can only be made to official explanations and statements issued by the lodge itself. The interpretations of the lodge brothers can thus be rejected as private opinion at any time.

Masonic readings

        Next to ritualistic activities and symbolism, Masonic readings and lodge lectures play an important role, and are an important tool of Masonic education. Ritual, symbolism, and Masonic concepts are thus explained and commented upon. The greatest emphasis is placed on a careful formulation and choice of the material, which differs at all times according to the degree involved. The General Handbook says:

        Lodge meetings are held to inform and educate the members of the association as to the highest purposes of the lodge. The highest purposes of the association are: nobility of humanity, human education and friendship to men, and a sense of world citizenship. The spiritual content of Freemasonry is first visibly represented through imagery and custom presented in a symbolic manner, as well as through expression in precise words.

Blueprints or building blocks

        Masonic language is accordingly intended to explain and justify the basic attitudes and concepts of Freemasonry to the intellect and the mind. As dignity and union are the principal characteristics of the construction itself, they are also the characteristics of the Masonic readings themselves, which must be edifying or devotional. Because of these graphic expressions, Masonic readings and lectures are also called blueprints or building blocks. They contain building plans, according to which the building of the temple or the association as a whole, or the life of the individual, is to be undertaken and perfected. Each of these readings is a building block to be integrated or perfected in the universal or individual construction. Each of these readings is a building block to be fitted into the general or individual construction.

        The selection of readings is the responsibility of the Brother Speaker. He appoints the speaker if he does not give the lecture personally. He might be called the educational leader of the lodge.

        These readings, in terms of time, occupy the greater part of temple work, impressing the individual lodge brother, and equipping him in accordance with the needs of the lodge.

Masonic texts

        The fourth tool of Masonic education consists of the extensive Masonic texts collected in the individual lodge libraries. The Brother Librarian takes care that a brother eager for knowledge obtains only those texts which are permitted to those of his degree.

        These are the chief characteristics of Masonic educational work. The work is facilitated by the fact that the individual lodge brothers associate with a closed group of people who all inhabit the same conceptual world, and, through many years of mutual social and family dealings, form a tightly knit clique.

Freemasonry as anti Church

        The historical attempts of Catholicism, chiefly in the 18th century, to render Freemasonry harmless through inner disintegration have already been mentioned. Leading clerical figures soon recognised, however, that a dangerous antagonist had arisen in Freemasonry, one which had to be viewed as anti Church. Thus, the struggle of the Pope and Jesuits against the Lodges began at an early date.

        The first action was taken in 1737 by the Inquisition, and was legally confirmed by the Papal Bull of 28th April, 1738, against Freemasonry, IN EMINENTI, by Pope Clement XII. It condemned the association of Freemasons and their secret meetings under punishment of immediate excommunication. The bull stated that at Masonic meetings:

        Men of all religions and sects, satisfied with a suitable appearance of a certain natural righteousness, bind themselves together through a tight secret association according to established laws and customs, and, at the same time, work in secrecy, in the sense that they are bound to eternal silence both through an oath taken on the Holy Scriptures and through the threat of dire punishment.

        From this time onwards, the struggle was carried on by both sides with undiminished vehemence.

Bulls of excommunication against Freemasonry

        A second bull against Freemasonry (PROVIDAS) was issued by Benedict XIV in 1751. Lennhoff-Posner writes in this regard:

        The results of this bull were even more serious in some countries than those of the first. In Spain, Freemasons were imprisoned by the Inquisition. Ferdinand VI decreed all members of the association guilty of high treason. The Franciscan, Brother Joseph Torrubia, Censor and Reviser of the Inquisition in Madrid, caused himself to be admitted to a lodge after being absolved in advance by a Papal penitentiary from the oath of secrecy which was to taken. In an accusatory document, he stated that the Freemasons were sodomites and witches, heretics, atheists, and rebels, who deserved to be burned in a devotional auto da fe for the greater glory of the Faith and for the strengthening of the faithful. In Naples, Portugal, Danzig, Aachen, Avignon, Savoy, and so on, as well as in Bavaria after 1784, Freemasonry was also exposed to persecution.

        These two bulls were followed in the course of time by other statements and actions by Church leaders against Freemasonry.

Conference of Aachen of 1928

        Despite their basic conflicts, these two supranational organisations have shown incipient signs of reconciliation, especially when it involved rendering harmless an antagonist threatening to become dangerous to both of them. Thus, in 1928, the so called Aachen Conference was held between the Catholic researcher on Freemasonry, the Jesuit Hermann Gruber, and the Freemasons Ossian Lang, Eugene Lennhoff, and Dr. Reichl. The intended object of the conference was the establishment of a civil peace. They resolved to raise the struggle out of the realm of mere political lying and slander campaigns, to which many participants on both sides had relegated the matter for decades, into the higher realm of critical, scientific, and spiritual struggle.

        Henceforward, Gruber and various individual Masonic researchers exchanged texts, and sent each other friendly letters containing analytical comparisons and book reviews. The struggle against Fascism and National Socialism had thus brought these supranational organisations together again.

        From the above, it is clear that the relationship between Freemasonry and Judaism is indissolubly tight and multifaceted in form. In summary, it must be stated:

        a) the spiritual, symbolic, and ritualistic foundations are Oriental Jewish. In its glorification of Yahweh, and the symbolism of the building of Solomon's Temple, it represents a concentration of the Jewish will to power. Its imagery, legends, tales, numerical mysticism, and numerology are entirely derived from the Old Testament and the Cabbala. At the same time, the question of when these elements were taken over by Freemasonry is of no importance.

        b) in statements on the Jewish problem issued by individual lodges of a humanitarian and Christian orientation, the Jewish question was discussed as a religious problem only, and never as a racial problem. Even the two grand lodges in Germany which, based on their Christian principles, accepted Jews not as members but as visitors only, expressed this repeatedly. Thus, the Grand Mother Lodge At The Three Globes wrote to the Dutch Grand Orient in 1881: We concur with you on principle that the exclusion of the Israelites from admittance to our lodges is not compatible with the basic principles of Freemasonry, and we express the sure hope that this restriction may be done away with by our lodges in the near future. Baptised Jews were accepted without further ado, even in Christian lodges, as brothers with equal rights.

        c) even on a personal level, Freemasonry is completely Jew dominated. That this is especially true of the Jewish higher degree organisations and Supreme Councils, has already been stated. Uniform policy among these higher degree Jews is assured by the fact that these same Jews are also members of parallel Jewish organisations, such as the B'nai Brith or the Alliance Israelite Universelle. Thus, the Masonic lord in England pulls the same string as the Jews in the American lodges and the Jewish wirepullers and Jewish Freemasons in the League Of Nations, when Jewish Masonic interests are at stake.

        Recruits to Freemasonry come primarily from the liberal, democratically oriented bourgeoisie. This is in no way altered by the fact that some members of the Old Prussian Grand Lodges acted patriotically, and remained faithful to the Kaiser.

        It has, however, been shown that, precisely in those Masonic organisations which are most active politically, that is, the higher degree systems and Supreme Councils, the Jews, due to their dual membership in every variety of left radical associations, bring a Marxist revolutionary note into Freemasonry which no longer reflects the original expressions of Freemasonry, with its liberal democratic tendencies.

        From history, we repeatedly see that Freemasonry first weakens and then disintegrates the fundamentals of nationally, politically, and racially determined forms of government using purely philosophical tactics, in order to set up and propagate democratic and liberalistic concepts in their place. That the great mass of Freemasons are unaware they are paving the way for radicalism, means little in practice. Their claims to have had no such intention have so far only resulted in preventing any light from being shed on the true meaning of Freemasonry. Nor is it any argument for Freemasonry that the radicals fight Freemasonry as a matter of course. This only happens after the radicals have seized power.

        The best example of this process is the rise of Bolshevism. When it was seen that many French Communists belonged to Masonic lodges, the following resolution was issued in 1923 by the 4th Congress of the Internationale:

Communist decision against freemasonry

        It is necessary for the leading organs of the Party to cut all the bridges leading to the bourgeoisie, and to break radically with Freemasonry. The Communist Party must be fully aware of the abyss which separates the proletariat from the bourgeoisie. But some of the leading elements in the Party have built camouflaged bridges over that abyss, by serving Freemasonry. Freemasonry is the most dishonest, the most infamous extortion of the proletariat by a bourgeoisie which tends to radicalism. We are compelled to fight it to the uttermost.

Trotsky on Freemasonry

        Even before this time, Trotsky had already taken a position on the matter. In February, 1923, the Masonic Newspaper Wien wrote as follows:

        Moscow: In Investia, according to The Times, Trotsky has issued a devastating attack on French Freemasonry, one which is certainly not based on correct information and is therefore unjustified, calling Freemasonry a plague boil on Communism, which threatens to poison it fully due to its reactionary influences: French Freemasonry is the capitalist enemy of Communism; it is as backward as the Church and Catholicism. It deadens the sharpness of the class struggle through mysticism, sentimentality, and moral formulistic rubbish; it is only supported by bankers, parliamentary wirepullers, and mercenary newspaper scribblers.

        The Masonic Newspaper of Wien makes the following comments on these expressions in the issue of March, 1923:

French Masonic circles and Communism

        The Moscow decision has had, however, little influence on French comrades who are Freemasons. A short time ago, they met to discuss the peculiar situation in which Moscow's decisions place them. A great number of delegates were present despite the prohibition by the Political Bureau of the Communist Party. After a long discussion, it was decided to remain Freemasons. The Management Committee was sent a note resolving to request a review of the decision by the Executive Office in Moscow. Since it is known, however, that Moscow will not yield in this matter, we may assume that the Communist Freemasons will soon be expelled from the Party.

        In conclusion, it then states:

Freemasonry on Communism

        There is an interesting article in Symbolism on the Moscow anathema, obviously from the Communist side, from which we quote the following sentences without identifying ourselves with them: Moscow will not admit that one can simultaneously be a Communist and a Freemason, since Communism has its orthodoxy, its absolutism, and most especially, its discipline. The latter, which is the power of the Red Army, is also the discipline of a party which has been militarily educated with a view to conquering the world. Freemasonry, which honours all honest beliefs, admits that there must be Communists among its sympathisers. It considers Communism in its true form to be an ideal towards which one must strive, while searching for the means to lessen the exaggerated individualism from which we all suffer. We all dream of solidarity from man to man, of a healing of the struggle for life. Freemasons abandon themselves to the most splendid of dreams in this respect, imagining Mankind united in one infinite family. But while a Freemason knows no limits in the conception of his ideals, he also knows, as a worker for progress, that results can only be achieved by work. But if the work is to produce results, it must begin on Man himself. If we wish to realise our dreams, we must incorporate them into our own lives, that is, we must practise, everyone of us, the ideals which inspire us, as much as we possibly can. If Communism attracts us, then let us attempt to practise it in our own modest positions in life. Let us speak softly through one such example on a small scale, proving in practice that Communism, despite the unfruitful attempts of the early Christians, is indeed possible. One initial successful experience would attract attention, and the world be gradually converted. Such is the Masonic procedure: it is based upon the hewing of the human stone, based on its intended use in the construction. Slow but sure, this procedure permits itself to depend upon the suitability of the available materials. The dream must be tested in life; it will be evaluated only according to the results achieved. The Communist Party is not so patient. It believes in the effectiveness of proclamations, imagining that that which is primarily of a moral order can be compelled through the power of a Red Army. It is therefore entirely correct in excommunicating Freemasonry, since, although we respect the Communist dream, we cannot allow ourselves to be enlisted in an organisation which employs ill considered, indeed, the least suitable methods.

        Apart from the statements about Communism in its pure form, the methods with which the leaders of radical Freemasonry wish to lead mankind to their ideal are especially enlightening. Such admissions that it wishes to perform the hewing of the human stone in a political direction as well, are very rare. The newspaper Symbolism was founded and published by a member of the lodge Work And Faithful True Friends and of the Supreme Council of France, Oswald Wirth, in Paris.

        From the quotations cited above, it is furthermore clear that the representatives of the politically active higher degrees are only repelled by the -- in their view -- superficial and overhasty methods of Communism. Until Freemasonry discerned the deadly enemy of Communism and World Freemasonry in Fascism and National Socialism, Freemasons stressed their differences more often. But as soon as the world split into two camps, the conflicts -- which were not very deeply rooted anyway -- were quickly forgotten.

        The result is the compromise policy of a Masonic People's Front policy, the work of compromise of the French Grand Orient and, under its emblem, the new alliance of France and the democracies with the Soviet Union, an alliance inspired by France and by the League Of Nations. Thus, the entire defensive front of World Communism and World Freemasonry, both dominated by Jews in key positions, merged together against Fascism and Germanism in any form.

        Like all strict, antidemocratically ruled States, Italy was soon compelled to take a stand against Freemasonry. The struggle against the Green Snake, as Freemasonry is called in Italy, assumed forms of extreme virulence. For a time, the lodge halls were actually taken by storm, and the lodge brothers physically attacked.

Antimasonry Law of 1925

        On 13th February, 1923, the Grand Council Of Fascists issued an initial decree against Freemasonry, according to which all Fascists who belonged to lodges were required to sever their connections with Freemasonry immediately. This decision was followed by a series of other decisions and laws which finally destroyed Italian Freemasonry completely in the Antimasonic Law of 1925, compelling a great many Italian Freemasons to emigrate.

        The tone in which Grand Master Torrigiani responded to the measures of the Fascist Government was extremely arrogant. In addition, Torrigiani attempted, in a typically Masonic fashion, to agitate the whole international world of the Masonic lodges against Fascist Italy. One of his publications in October, 1922, ended with the following words:

        We wished to propagate the concept of humanity, the consciousness of a brotherhood of Nations. That remains the guideline of our work today. And therefore we wish to hope that Fascist theories will not assume forms which would strike at all concepts of democracy and freedom, ending in dictatorship and oligarchy.

        In 1924, he addressed a letter to Mussolini ending as follows:

        We gladly assume the guilt of being true protectors of the ideas which have made Italy grand: the ideas of freedom, the sovereignty of the Folk, the autonomy of the State as against the hierarchy of the Church, and equal rights for all. But this attitude must not prevent Your Excellency from ensuring that the laws are used for our protection as well.

        Precisely such statements as these, which always stressed democratic basic attitudes and a striving towards international solidarity, proved to Fascism that no compromise was possible between its attitudes and those of Freemasonry. In 1925, Mussolini explained in Folk Of Italy:

Mussolini on Freemasonry

        Freemasonry is combated by Fascists because it is an international organisation which conducts its activity in Italy on the basis of orders which are issued in foreign countries. One can be a good Frenchman and simultaneously a Freemason, because the Freemasonry of the Rue Cadet -- the headquarters of the Grand Orient of France -- is an excellent French propagandist, especially in the Mediterranean Sea area, the Danube River States, and in the Balkans. One can be a good Englishman and simultaneously a practising Freemason, because both English and American Freemasons peddle their Anglosaxon world propaganda in a pietistic, humanitarian direction, as well as in a mercantile sense. But one cannot be a good Italian and simultaneously a Freemason, because the Palazzo Giustiniani follows foreign directives. The Giustiniani Freemasons were always against Italian actions in Abyssinia, Libya, in the Dodecanese, in Dalmatia, in Albania. They supported participation in the Great War on internationalist grounds, but they devalued our victory. They wanted the war, but hindered the harvest of the legitimate and holy fruit of military victory. (From Lennhoff: Freemasonry, page 350.)

        It is interesting to note that Italian Freemasonry, in regards to its past, adduced the same arguments as German Freemasonry, claiming that the unification of Italy was the work of Freemasonry. By contrast, a memorandum prepared by a committee created especially for that purpose proved that Freemasonry played no part in the great Italian nationalistic movement of the 19th century -- the Risorgimento. With the sentencing of the Masonic General Capello to 30 years in prison and the banishment of Torrigiani to the Liparic Islands, this episode in Italian history came to an end. General Capello was accused of supporting Zaniboni's assassination attempt on Mussolini.

        Italian Freemasons living in exile founded two lodges in Paris, Italia and Italia Nuova, under the obedience of the Grand Lodge Of France. At the suggestion of lodge brother Ferrari, the Grand Commander of the Supreme Council of Italy, who died in 1929, a Supremo Consiglio was also founded in London in 1930.

Adolf Hitler and Freemasonry

        From the beginning, the National Socialist Movement, through its Leader, was aware of the unbridgeable chasm which yawned between it and all currents and groups of Freemasonry. In My Struggle, The Leader expressed himself on the problem of Freemasonry:

        To strengthen his political position, the Jew attempts to narrow the restrictions on racial and state citizenship one step at a time. To attain this objective, he fights for religious tolerance with all the tenacity which is proper to him, and in Freemasonry -- which has fallen entirely into his hands -- he has found an excellent fighting instrument, as well as an instrument for the attainment of his aims. The leadership of the ruling parties as well as the upper strata of the political and economic bourgeoisie fall through the Masonic web right into his trap, without any need for them ever to have been the slightest bit aware of it.

Alfred Rosenberg

        Alfred Rosenberg made fundamental statements on Freemasonry in the Mythos Of The Twentieth Century, accompanied by numerous political texts, newspapers, and newspaper articles (for example, in the periodical founded by him, The World Struggle, in the Folkish Observer, The Crime Of The Freemasons (1922), Freemasonic World Politics In The Light Of Critical Research, and so on.)

Hermann Gцring

        Where State Police measures against German Freemasonry after 1933 are concerned, Reich Marshall Hermann Gцring was decisive in his position as Prussian Minister President. When the Old Prussian lodges attempted to continue their existence in National Socialist Germany, Gцring determined that there was no more room for any kind of Freemasonry.

Reich Leader Buch

        The fundamentally negative attitude of the NSDAP towards Freemasonry was also expressed by the Supreme Party Judge, Reich Leader Buch, in many fundamental decisions and decrees.

        Expression was repeatedly given to National Socialism's hostility to Freemasonry in many other writings and texts of leading men of the Party and State.

Party Decrees

Amnesty Decree

        The basic official Party position is reflected in the required declaration, made upon one's honour upon the acceptance of any application for Party membership, that the applicant is not, and has never been, a member of a Masonic lodge. Equivalent declarations are required upon entering any of the NSDAP membership organisations (SA, SS, NSKK), and merged associations (for example, the NSFK). By an Amnesty Decree of The Leader dated 20th April, 1938, the possibility was opened of remaining in the Party and its member organisations for some former Freemasons who had joined the Party after 30th January, 1933, but prior to the regulation of acceptance. Nevertheless, the prescription was strictly adhered to that higher degree Freemasons, and holders of important lodge offices, were not permitted to continue to belong to the Party or its member organisations, nor, in the case of new applications, could such applicants be admitted. A right of amnesty has been reserved by The Leader for special cases.

Defence Forces Decree

Decree regarding officials

        The employment of former Freemasons, both in the Defence Forces (as Officers or Military Officials) and the State and municipal administrations, and so on, was also regulated by corresponding decrees. Though a general dismissal of former lodge members was not ordered, the influence of Masonic personnel was nevertheless checked by restrictive conditions.

Prohibition of Freemasonry

        This fundamental attitude is also reflected in State political measures against Masonic and similar organisations in Germany, which were either induced to dissolve voluntarily, or were compelled to put a stop to their activities through Police prohibitions.

National Socialism's struggle against Freemasonry

        National Socialism set about to handle the Masonic question systematically and with a conscious aim, in contrast to other antimasonic movements and States in which the outraged population destroyed valuable material in the lodge buildings during riots and physical attacks, thereby making the struggle against Freemasonry more difficult and in some cases impossible.

        The continued existence of Freemasonry could not be tolerated either on ideological grounds or on the grounds of State security. Broad segments of the population expressed their animosity towards the lodges. One lodge after the other closed its doors -- even if involuntarily, and, in some cases, after considerable delay.

Dissolution of the Grand Lodges

        Although some of the Grand Lodges -- such as the Masonic Association At the Rising Sun, the Symbolic Grand Lodge Of Germany, and the Supreme Council For Germany -- drew the only conclusion possible to them in view of The Leader's accession to power, dissolving themselves as early as March, 1933, while simultaneously destroying their lodge archives, the majority of the lodges did not abandon the hope of being able to embed themselves in the new State. Like the hostile outside world and Jewish emigrants, they dreamed that National Socialist rule would not last long.

Humanitarian Grand Lodges

        As for the humanitarian Grand Lodges which embodied the Masonic ideology all too openly and which had a large percentage of racially Jewish members, it was soon made clear to them in like manner that their continued existence would not be tolerated. They either dissolved themselves, or their activity was terminated by State Police action.

Old Prussian Grand Lodges

        The Old Prussian Grand Lodges attempted to disguise themselves through name changes to Christian Orders. After minor, purely superficial changes, they pretended that they had ceased to be Masonic organisations, but they were compelled to readopt their former name by a decree of the Prussian Minister President Gцring.

        All the efforts of the Old Prussian Grand Lodges and some of the humanitarian Grand Lodges to gain permission to continue their existence were doomed to meet with resistance, so that their Grand Masters were, by July, 1935, finally prepared to decide upon dissolution.

        Thus ended the activity of the remaining Masonic organisations, just as many other similar organisations were also prevented from acting in a manner counter to National Socialism by State Police prohibitions.

Defence committee of the lodges

        Long before The Leader's accession to power, the lodges had attempted to defend themselves against the increasingly forceful attacks by nationalistic and racially inclined movements. This aim was served by their own specially created defence committees, which obtained all texts hostile to Freemasonry and were informed of all antimasonic meetings and measures. In the Old Prussian Grand Lodges, guidelines were distributed to members concerning their behaviour with regard to attacks on Freemasonry. Upon instructions from their Grand Master, for example, the question of any possible membership in the lodges was simply denied by many Freemasons upon entering the NSDAP, a step in which they believed themselves justified by the transformation of the lodges into Orders.

Masonic arguments

        By every conceivable tactic, the lodges and their members attempted to integrate and conform after 30th January, 1933, denying all international relationships and associations. Philojewish attitudes and activities were simply denied. Antisemitic attitudes were even claimed, and attempts were made to represent the lodges as harmless social and welfare associations. In a similar manner, attempts were made to represent the great men of German history as the exponents of true Freemasonry, and to explain away major features of lodge ritual as Germanic heritage.

Masonic economic favouritism as against National Socialism

        The behaviour of the lodge brothers proved only too well that their Masonic training had made them incapable of recognising the signs of the times and the responsibilities of the new era. An attempt to represent the socialism in a small circle practised by the lodges as identical with that of National Socialism shows this clearly. The socialism of the Freemasons was the economic favouritism of a clique, which would have been sufficient justification in itself for putting an end to the activities of Freemasonry in Germany.

        The attempt to deny their international relationships and their close coordination with Freemasons in other countries reflects the mendacity of Freemasonry, which can only be international, as the leading Freemason and Jew Dr. Posner of Karlsbad remarked in 1925 at the inauguration of the Austrian Supreme Council:

Freemasonic Internationale

        There can only be one Freemasonry: the International Freemasonic chain of brotherhood. In Romantic Freemasonry, we find Internationale the designation: universal Freemasonry, French family. We should also speak of universal Freemasonry, German family. It should be declared that each family of Freemasonry speaks the language of its heart, of course, but that these families are only facets of one cubic stone, which is universal Freemasonry.

World Freemasonry's struggle against National Socialism

        While Freemasonry had proclaimed its hostility to Fascism and National Socialism even before 1933, an unparalleled campaign of vilification by Freemasonry against National Socialist Germany set in after The Leader's accession to power.

        Jewish and other German emigrants were leading figures in this activity. We need only mention the speaking activities of the Jew Georg Bernhard, the famous publisher of the Vossischen Zeitung and the emigrant newspaper Parisian Daily Newspaper, and the Jew Gumbel, a former Professor at Heidelberg, who originated the term -- referring to the dead soldiers of the 1914-18 War -- fallen on the field of dishonour.

        In the French lodges, these men began a campaign of vilification against National Socialism. At international Masonic congresses, resolutions were taken against National Socialist Germany, some of which were transmitted to the League Of Nations. American lodges encouraged the activity of the Anti Nazi League.

        The union of Austria to Germany, the return of the Sudetenland to Germany, and the creation of the Protectorate Of Bohemia And Moravia gave international Freemasonry, which was decisively under French influence, the occasion for wild attacks on the Reich of Adolf Hitler, not to mention Masonic intervention for emigrants from Austria and former Czechoslovakia, who were furnished with emigration papers due to their Masonic connections, in order to liberate them from the hell of National Socialism.

        North American Freemasons contributed tens of thousands of dollars to the support of Masonic emigrants from central Europe, the distribution of which was controlled by a special aid committee in Paris. In like manner, considerable sums of money were collected from an astonishing variety of countries and steered to Spanish Freemasonry on the Red side of the Spanish civil war. The Peoples Front in France was the most visible expression of Freemasonry's political will: a merger of all elements inclined towards republicanism, democracy, and Marxism, combined with the liberal bourgeoisie. In the Spanish Civil War, French Freemasons demanded the armed intervention of France in favour of the Reds. After the Mьnchen Accords, they demanded war with Germany, at all times in close cooperation with the Freemason President Roosevelt, whose intervention was demanded to prop up the Masonic Peace Treaty Of Versailles. For years before the present war, the international press, closely intertwined with international Freemasonry, stood shoulder to shoulder in the struggle against National Socialist Germany, and the war begun in the fall of 1939 is only the continuation of this struggle by other means.

        When Goethe called Freemasonry a State within a State, he was entirely correct. No Government which intends to carry through its objectives strictly and in a manner compatible with a sense of responsibility can tolerate Freemasonry, which conducts uncontrollable, anonymous, and therefore unaccountable dealings through its international and personal associations.

        From within and without, Freemasonry penetrates officialdom, economic organisations, and influential positions in political and spiritual life, a fact which is all the more alarming because every Freemason is obliged to be a Freemason first, even outside the lodge, and to act in accordance with his Masonic training. A Masonic politician, as a lodge proclamation expressly states, must never forget that he is first a Freemason, and only secondly a politician who is responsible to his constituents and to his Folk.

        The Masonic oath, the duty of obedience and silence, which must be taken before entering the lodge, must be deemed immoral, because it must be taken without any knowledge of the scope of the obligation. How many conflicts such an obligation may entail, can never be calculated.

        By contrast, National Socialism stands for unconditional duty and responsibility.

        The worldview of National Socialism is Nordic; that of the Freemason is Asiatic Jewish. The National Socialistic position is racially conscious; that of the lodges, antiracial and projewish.

        The communality of National Socialism is the living feature of racially related types, the racial community, not the caste system and clique of interests of the bourgeoisie organised in the lodges.

        National Socialism contrasts an unconditional racial nationalism against the cosmopolitan internationalism of Freemasonry.

        The orientation of the German Folk according to the basic concepts of National Socialism stands in stark contrast to Masonic teaching methods and educational systems, with their racially foreign symbols and Jewish temple service.

        It was therefore indispensable to smash all Masonic organisations in Germany, and to eliminate the possibility of Masonic influence in the broadest possible manner.

        Link by link, The Leader's policies in Europe have broken the confines of the Masonic world chain. Following the dissolution of the lodges in Germany, the Masonic organisations in former Austria were next to be eliminated. In the national territory of former Czechoslovakia, the lodges dissolved themselves on the grounds of caution. In former Poland, they have been compelled to give way before the strength of antimasonic forces. In Norway, Belgium, and Luxembourg, the lodges were dissolved only after the occupation by German troops. In France, the Government recognised, in Freemasonry, one of the parties jointly guilty for the defeat of France, and prohibited Masonic activity; Masonic personal influence was also eliminated by corresponding laws. The events of the war in southeastern Europe have paralysed the activities of Freemasonry in major areas, so that Masonry is now represented in a few European countries only. Apart from Denmark and Sweden, it works chiefly out of Switzerland.

        Outside the European continent, Freemasonry still enjoys a position of unweakened power in Grand Britain, and particularly in North America, where it has been decisive in steering political opinion against National Socialism's New Order in Europe.

        In their last bastions, Freemasons work together with the other enemies of National Socialism, with World Jewry, the political churches, and international Marxism.

        All German racial comrades must recognise the dangers of the liberalistic Masonic body of thought. Any attempt to reintroduce Masonic thoughts and symbolism, in whatever form or appearance, ever again in German literature, in German art and science, or in political concepts, must be nipped in the bud.

        We learn from history that Freemasonry has been forbidden many times, and in many different States; yet it fell upon the Folks again and again, in times of crisis, like a poison of corruption.

        The present text is intended to contribute towards protecting the German Folk from such a fate.

        For further study, we recommend the series of texts, Sources And Studies On The Question Of Freemasonry, Berlin, 1942, Nordland Verlag, and F. A. Six, Studies In The Spiritual History Of Freemasonry, Hamburg, 1942, Hanseatic Publishing Institution.